Love Is Not a Gadget
by blown-transistor
Summary: "The moment you think you know what's going on in a woman's head is the moment your goose is well and truly cooked." Steve Rogers finds his old friend's words running through his head seventy years later as he navigates his new time. Something quickly began to smell like it was burning when Howard Stark's son comes into the picture... (Hints of Pepperony, Tony/OC, Steve/Darcy)
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

_Don't you want to know how we keep starting fires? It's my desire, it's my desire, it's my desire. Danger! Danger! High Voltage! When we touch, when we kiss! Danger! Danger! High Voltage! When we touch, when we kiss when we touch…_

A freshly manicured right hand shot out from under the fluffy blankets atop the queen sized bed and met the glass top of the nightstand with a cold slap at the sound of her cell phone ringing. When the hand closed around the rectangular object that interrupted her _wonderful_ dream of David Tennant's portrayal of the Tenth Doctor shouting his hallmark "Allons-y" and dragging her off into the TARDIS, she slowly opened one brown eye to read the screen. "Why in the world can't S.H.I.E.L.D. ever need an emergency consultation during office hours?" she groaned, voice thick with sleep after sliding the green icon across the screen to answer the call.

"_They found him_," the decidedly male voice announced with thinly veiled excitement from the other end of the line.

"Coulson, it's…" she trailed off and pulled the phone away from her face long enough to ascertain the time. "4:24 in the morning. I was in the middle of another one of my dreams of being Ten's companion. Who did they find? I can't think of anyone who's missing."

"_They found Captain Rogers an hour ago, Holly_."

A mop of long, brown curly hair suddenly shot out from underneath the covers. The mention of the world's first superhero made her eyes open and try to focus in the dark bedroom. "I'm sorry, I think I'm losing my mind. Did you just say that they found a 'Captain Rogers'?"

"_There's only one 'Captain Rogers' I'd be calling you about at 4:30 in the morning. A Russian oil crew found the ship in the ice_."

"So I'm not hallucinating," Holly Morgan scoffed before a sobering thought hit her. "They just found Captain America seventy years too late."

"_It's not too late. He's still alive_."

She sighed heavily. Her friend was clearly delusional. "Phil, the man's been on ice for seven decades. There's no way he can still be al-"

"_Doctors confirmed it. We need you to come in. The plane's going to land in two and a half hours_."

"And you're going to be there to meet him?" Holly asked with a smile. "You're screaming internally right now, aren't you?"

"_Two and a half hours, Miss Morgan_."

* * *

"I'd best be getting combat pay for this," she whispered out of the side of her mouth at Phil Coulson with a yawn. She hadn't been this dressed down at work in…a very long time. Owing to the ungodly hour, she didn't suppose many would care that she sported a black tank top underneath a grey v-necked sweater and stonewashed jeans. She shook her head, suppressing laughter. The middle-aged agent she'd befriended her first day as a consultant for the super-secret organization four years earlier was clearly trying to maintain some professionalism and contain his inner fanboy as the smile he was trying not to show was slowly breaking through.

He'd told her some of the more exciting things he'd been called out for. She descended into fits of uncontrolled laughter when he told her about threatening to tase Tony Stark "and watch _Supernanny _while you drool into the carpet". She recalled making a similar threat to the billionaire years earlier, only it didn't involve reality television…

Phil was out in New Mexico earlier the previous year when an atmospheric disturbance had yielded nothing less than the Norse God of Thunder and his cohorts. He'd even brought her back a souvenir – a giant metal shell of a man that shot fire out of its face (or so Coulson claimed). Months later, she still wasn't entirely sure how he managed to get a crate the size of a tractor trailer into her lab, but somehow he did… And Director Fury attached a note to the crate requesting her to not only figure out how it worked, but to also work up a prototype to adapt it for S.H.I.E.L.D use.

Her thoughts were jarred back to the present when a heavy metal door swung open suddenly, making sharp contact with the wall behind it. She watched her comrade snap to attention when Director Fury entered the room ahead of the swirl of his black trench coat.

He shoved an envelope into Coulson's hand when he stopped in front of the consultant and his agent. "He's going to need a place to stay. The instructions are in the envelope. Morgan will help you when she's not using her patent to make the Captain a new suit."

Holly's brown eyes widened in surprise. If she weren't in a situation where it would be frowned upon, she could have began giggling in childish delight and skipped promptly off to her lab. She contemplated asking the intimidating director to repeat his command so she could record it. She could send one copy to her grandmother and put a copy on the graves of her father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. "Holy shit," she muttered after Fury had walked away. She had a chance to follow in their footsteps in a way that idiot cousin of hers never would be able to.

The heavy metal door swung open again, this time a medical team wheeling a gurney entered the dimly lit foyer. The attendants spoke softly to each other, checking various life signs as they walked. "Morgan, you have to come with us," one barked, thrusting an instantly recognizable circular shield into her hands. "You're in charge of this and the uniform, when we get it off."

She chanced a glance over at Phil, smiling when she saw his mouth agape. "I'll need some help." Her eyes suddenly fell upon the angular profile of Captain Steve Rogers. She found herself licking her lips before shaking herself out of it. Not only was the man unconscious, but he had to be over ninety. Fifteen years was a difference she could work with. She'd done it. Sixty-five years? Nope.

"Fury said bring whoever you need."

Phil Coulson thought he might faint when he realized that Holly was trying to hand him the shield.

"And who better to help me?" she asked with a grin. "The uniform will take a while."

Shifting the shield onto his left arm, the older agent quickly pulled out his wallet from the back pocket of his black pants. He quickly produced a folded up piece of white paper and handed it to Holly. "I had some ideas about the uniform."

**Author's Note:**I'm back! I know I said that I wasn't going to publish this story until I had more written, but I decided not to wait. I need a kick in the butt to make myself write. I've got a good chunk done, and boy is it going to be a fun ride. Many thanks to **trick-photography** for being my beta and sounding board. I've been working on this story for a good three or four months now. This story will eventually be a Tony/OC pairing, along with Steve and a surprise character. Get excited. I can't wait to hear what y'all think!

As always, I don't own anything...other than Holly Morgan.


	2. Chapter One

**Chapter One**

_One week later…_

"Coulson!" Holiday Morgan hissed to the older agent as she stared through the one-way glass into the mock World War II-era recovery room constructed inside S.H.I.E.L.D.'s headquarters at Director Fury's request. Clearly, she wasn't getting through to him, as he was blatantly staring through the glass as well. "Phil Coulson!"

The use of his given first name instead of "Agent" snapped him to attention. His eyes turned from the stirring super-soldier in the next room to the brunette beside him who was desperately trying to tie her tie as fast as she could with fumbling fingers. "Miss Morgan, he's waking up! Get in there!" he responded in an exasperated tone.

"Are my seams straight?" she asked in a panicked whisper. "If this is going to work, he can't notice my se-"

The older agent cocked his head and peered at Holiday Morgan's calves. "Straight as an arrow, nothing to worry about. You've gotta get in there!"

Taking a deep breath, she smoothed down her already perfect brown curls and her now tied uniform tie. "What about my lipstick?"

"Perfect as always, Holiday Golightly. GO!" He shoved a tiny electronic box with a button on the side into her right hand, shaking his head and stepping out of view as he watched her prepare to open the door.

She took another deep breath, steeling her nerve and putting on a calm mask to hide her panic. She'd been ogling Steve Rogers' body through the glass since the day they'd brought him back to New York after he'd been pulled from the ice. She slowly opened the door into the room. "Good morning, or should I say afternoon?" she asked with a polite smile, looking up from her watch into the big blue eyes of the world's first superhero. If there was ever a time she needed to have a poker face, this was it. She wasn't near as star-struck as her friend, Agent Coulson, but a girl can certainly appreciate a finely-toned male form, right?

"Where am I?" he asked, voice slightly rough from disuse as he shifted his gaze from the room around him to the brunette in front of him.

"You're in a recovery room in New York City." Holly smiled. This was a smile she didn't have to fake. He'd probably saved the world by downing that plane all those years ago. She was genuinely glad that he was awake. Maybe one day, she'd even have the guts to thank him for it.

"Where am I really?" Steve's blue eyes narrowed as he stared at the unfamiliar woman. Something more than the old baseball game was wrong here.

"I'm afraid I don't understand," she countered. She still sported a smile, but was certain he caught it slip.

"The game. It's from May 1941. I know 'cause I was there." Watching her dark eyes widen, he realized that it wasn't just a rebroadcast of the game due to a rain delay. He stood up from the metal-framed bed and walked towards her, hoping that merely his presence would intimidate her enough to give him the information he desperately sought. "Now I'm gonna ask you again, where am I?"

"Captain Rogers…" Holly lowered her head, making like she wanted to admit something, before pressing the button on the tiny box Coulson had given her.

"Who are you?" he demanded just before two men in strange clothes entered through the same door that she did moments before.

"Captain Rogers, wait," she called after the super-soldier shoved the two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents through the wall of the makeshift room and made a break for it. She stepped through the massive hole in the wall. "All agents, code 13. I repeat, all agents code 13." She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes in exasperation. When she finally removed her hands, she made sure to be careful to reform her carefully applied false eyelashes.

Fury said this was supposed to be fool-proof. She hadn't designed the room. She hadn't decided which baseball game recording to air. It wasn't her fault. Had the game not given it away, she could have attributed the falter in her smile to a need to thank the Captain for saving a male family member she could have made up on the spot from a HYDRA camp. As soon as she saw him take off through the front door, she left the mock recovery room via the actual door (not the hole that had been punched through the wall) to retrieve her actual clothes and made her way to the nearest bathroom to change back.

When she emerged from the lobby bathroom fifteen minutes later wearing a knee-length black and white hounds tooth wool skirt, black button-up shirt, and black stilettos, she was surprised to see the super-soldier walking back into the building. _Perhaps now would be a good time to just leave for the day_, she thought as she turned towards the elevator that would take her up to the floor her laboratory occupied to retrieve her massive purse. Just before her French manicured nail touched the button to call the elevator, she heard an embarrassed voice behind her ask "Ma'am?" quietly. Holly turned around to see Captain Rogers standing behind her with a tinge of pink on his cheeks. "What can I do for you, Captain Rogers?" she asked as she clasped her hands in front of her.

"I-I just wanted to apologize for the way I spoke to you back there." He nervously rubbed the back of his neck, bringing a slight smile to her face. "That's not any way to talk to a lady, even if one wakes up in a strange place."

It took almost all of Holly's self control not to give him the "I should be mad, but you're so darn cute that I can't be" look one might give to a small puppy when it licks someone's hand after it did something wrong. It took the rest of her self control not to burst out into a smile and begin to fawn over the welcome influx of some old fashioned manners. Instead, she held out her right hand in a welcoming gesture. "Holiday Morgan. Nice to finally meet you, Captain," she said with a polite smile. When he accepted the offered hand and shook it, she continued. "I should apologize for that deception back there…"

"The director said he wanted to break it to me slowly," Steve interjected as he shifted his eyes to look at the floor. Breaking away and running definitely hadn't been one of his finer moments, but it seemed like a perfectly valid reaction at the time.

"Yes. It was all his idea, including my involvement." She paused and let out a small chuckle before pulling her hair back up into the ponytail it had been in before she quickly changed into the old uniform. "I've discovered that my definition of a consultant's position and S.H.I.E.L.D.'s definition of a consultant's position are two completely different things. S.H.I.E.L.D.'s clearly involves playing dress-up."

He stared blankly at the disarmingly blunt brunette. Was she really speaking about her position at a government agency in terms of a children's game? This was by far not the first time that a lady had left Steve Rogers speechless. And it probably won't be the last, he mused. Maybe she just knew more than he did, but this dame that looked like she stepped off the cover of a 1941 _Vogue_ didn't even seem fazed by his presence.

Holly smiled. She couldn't read his exact thoughts, but she could tell his mind was running a mile a minute. "Captain, I've been with S.H.I.E.L.D. for a while now. Would you believe me if I said pulling you out of the ice and having you wake up a-okay is not the weirdest thing that's happened since I've been here? Hell, I've seen weirder things _this week_." She chuckled when his jaw dropped. "I'm being completely serious."

"I… I find that very difficult to believe, ma'am. I don't even understand _how_ I'm here."

"I'm sure you'll find out soon enough, but let's just say for now that where there's a 'first superhero' title, it means there are others." When the stunned expression only intensified, she patted his bicep (god, she'd been _itching_ to do that) before pushing the elevator button. "Ask me about Iron Man later."

* * *

Steve Rogers stood ramrod straight in the elevator as he rode up to the floor he'd been told to report to by Director Fury. He'd been back in the land of the living for all of seventy-two hours, and already S.H.I.E.L.D. had everything a person living in this strange time would need sorted out for him. Clearly, a super-secret government agency can get things done faster than anticipated.

The Director had personally visited his temporary housing in one of the sublevels of S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters the night before, handing him an envelope containing everything he'd need to pick up life right where he left off…seventy years after he left. He'd been given a motorcycle license that said he was born in 1983 instead of 1918 and something called a debit card that would give him access to his recently unfrozen back pay and S.H.I.E.L.D. stipend. As the Director was exiting the room, almost as an afterthought, he added that Captain Rogers should report at ten the following morning to be taken to his permanent housing.

Steve spent the rest of the night unable to sleep, not that he felt he needed to. After all, he'd slept for seventy years. Surely, there had to be something else he could do. Not only would sleep just plain not come, his mind wouldn't shut off and kept him up worrying. Would his "permanent housing" be filled with all manner of strange gizmos that he didn't know how to work like this temporary housing? Was this "permanent housing" someplace on Manhattan where he would stand out like a sore thumb? When he looked at the clock and realized that it was six in the morning, he got up and went for a walk. He even stopped to use this debit card for the first time to get a cup of coffee and a muffin. Surprisingly, the tiny plastic card worked.

His thoughts returned to the present when the elevator dinged, signaling that he had reached his destination on the tenth floor. Stepping out onto the white marble that contained flecks of black, he squinted in an effort to see through the sun-drenched room. He straightened his dark pinstripe pants and crisp green and white checkered button-down shirt before rounding the corner. His eyes fell falling on the brunette that he saw when he woke up sitting at a desk amongst several tables covered in various…objects that he couldn't place as he peered into the first door on the left.

"Good morning, Captain," Holiday Morgan said with a smile as she stood up from the table, dropping a large black object shaped like a gun with a bang. Since she'd been told that her day would involve helping the world's first superhero into his new place, she opted for khaki wool pants paired with a white tank top, thick navy cardigan, and blue heels. You can't help someone into a new place in a skirt.

"Good morning, Miss Morgan." Phew! He'd spoken to a female without messing that up. Maybe the years in the ice turned his inability to talk to women into an ability?

She slid on her fur-lined aviator jacket to shield her from the crisp early March air and picked up her large bag. "Ready to go?" Her coffee had _definitely_ set in. There was no way she'd be this chipper without it after working extremely late nights recently. To say that she was living on adrenaline, caffeine, and cream to erase the bags under her eyes was an understatement. Functioning, yes. Living, no.

"Y-Yes, I suppose," he replied nervously. He couldn't help but think of several occasions where he could have used a jacket that warm during the war. It almost looked GI, too… Steve shook himself out of his line of thought when he realized he was trailing behind. "Shouldn't I get my things?"

Holding her large leather bag in front of her knees, she pressed the down arrow and turned back to him. "The things you had with you are already in a car downstairs waiting for us."

"That was fast," Steve murmured. Was someone outside his door waiting for him to leave? That would just be downright…spooky. When the elevator door opened, he stepped in behind her.

"You get used to it," Holly lied effortlessly. She'd been at S.H.I.E.L.D. for four years now and still wasn't used to the speed at which an agent would show up at her door if something major was happening.

He let out a heavy sigh and tried to remember what Bucky had told him years ago about making small talk, even if you weren't romantically interested in the girl. It was just polite. "So, uh, how long have you been here at S.H.I.E.L.D.?" He forced himself to look up into Miss Morgan's face for fear that she could sense how nervous he was if he didn't.

"Four years. I moved here from California to 'consult'…" She paused to choose her next words carefully, to avoid giving up too much personal information "…and I'm still here." She breathed a sigh of relief when the elevator opened at the motor pool floor. Hopefully he wouldn't ask any more questions.

Steve opened his mouth to ask more questions, but they died on his lips when she hopped off the elevator car and made her way to a desk in front of him. She seemed a bit cagey, but he had to constantly remind himself that he wasn't a harmless ninety pound asthmatic anymore. He _could_ be intimidating…He mindlessly followed her across the underground garage to a black car that looked exactly like one of the ones that barricaded him in when he ran into Times Square. Shaking his head when she pressed a button on the key and the lights flashed, he opened the passenger's side door. "Ma'am, where are we going if you don't mind me asking?" he inquired, buckling his seatbelt as she did the same before turning the engine over.

"Brooklyn," Holly said, skillfully navigating the car out of the garage and onto the streets of Manhattan. "And we're not at S.H.I.E.L.D. anymore, so please, call me Holly."

"B-Brooklyn?" he choked out, not even hearing the rest of what she said. He was going home after all this time! If he weren't in the car with a dame who looked like she could _end him_ with just a look, he might give into his baser instincts and cry.

Her dark gaze softened when she looked over and saw the joy and relief in his eyes. "We have an apartment set up for you there. It's been in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s possession for years. When you were found alive and it would only be a matter of time before you woke up, the decision was made to convert it back into a residence for you." She reached over and put her hand on his forearm that rested on the center console, unable to stifle a smirk as he flinched at the contact. "Figured it was the least we could do for you after what you did for us."

Steve cleared his throat and looked out at the passing skyscrapers. "I was just doing my duty ma'am." Out of the corner of a blue eye, he saw his chauffer glaring at him for a moment before he suddenly remembered what she'd told him. "I was just doing my duty, _Holly_," he corrected quickly.

As the skyscrapers of Manhattan faded into the row houses and walk-ups of Brooklyn, he began to relax and feel like things were a little more familiar. He watched as she turned off the highway and began making her way through the tiny packed side streets. He smiled. A good number of the buildings had changed, but the kids playing and the people living their lives didn't. When he felt the car stop, he looked up at the three-story walk-up she parked next to. "Is this…" He pointed up at the dark bricked building hopefully.

"Your new home, yes," she interrupted with a smile. She turned off the car and pressed a button on the black key fob to open the back hatch. Watching Steve exit the car, Holly offered up a silent prayer to the god she hadn't prayed to in years that her decorating skills were still up to snuff.

She'd been given a credit card with an _ungodly_ high limit on it about ten minutes after the soldier had been returned to S.H.I.E.L.D. still unconscious with explicit instructions to decorate an apartment so it looked like 1942…before he woke up. Somewhere in between spending her days working on various projects for S.H.I.E.L.D., spending her nights coming behind the painters and placing furniture around the rooms and making sure everything in the apartment that could be laundered was (to give it that clean laundry, home-y scent), she managed to type up detailed instructions for the computer, answering machine, television, Blu-ray player, and basic cell phone she'd purchased as incidentals for Captain Rogers. Hopefully, the cheerfully wrapped gift in her bag would break the ice…

Carrying two duffel bags containing all that was left of his possessions, Steve followed Miss Morgan up the front steps, into the building, and up three flights of stairs to his new home. He watched as she produced a key ring with two keys on it from her pants pocket. She was quick to point out that the smaller of the two was for his mailbox downstairs as she inserted the larger one into the lock and turned. He dropped the bags in shock as he stepped past her and into the apartment. The living room at least looked like something out of a _Better Homes and Gardens_ magazine…from just before he shipped off to Europe.

Holly let her head drop back in relief for a brief second, taking his apparent shock as a sign that her prayers had been answered. The antique dealers she'd called in a panic over the past couple days thought she was absolutely batty when she offered to pay insane amounts of money to have the larger items delivered _immediately_. Admittedly, the color scheme wasn't one she would have chosen for her own domicile (too much tan on the walls), but obviously it was a hit with its intended audience. She smiled as he darted off to the left into the kitchen, only to quickly return to the living room and dart into the bedroom and bathroom off the right side.

"I… How did…" He found himself at a loss for words. Some of the things he noticed offhand hadn't been made since _before_ he went down.

"I take it our esteemed one-eyed leader didn't mention that he gave _me_ a blank check and told me to decorate your apartment?" she asked with a laugh. A super-soldier at a loss for words? Clearly she did her job.

Steve looked down at the woman, who with her shoes, came up to the bottom tip of his nose and scoffed in disbelief. "You found all these things?"

A yawn managed to escape before she could stop it. "I have it on good authority that I've slept about as much as you have since your little jog." She held her hands up, motioning at the apartment around her. "I'm proud of _myself_ that I got this done in a week."

He looked at the floor sheepishly, rubbing his hand over the back of his neck. "I guess I should thank you. Clearly, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s definition of a consultant's position includes interior decorating, too."

"I guess it does, but hey, I get to get out of the lab for a while. Sometimes I need to be reminded what sunshine is." She walked across the room and set her purse on the dark wood of the desk by the window. "Did you look in the bureau or the closet when you sprinted into the bedroom?" When he shook his head, she nodded. "We uh… We used your old uniform as a size gauge and got you some more clothes, too. Don't worry," Holly added hastily, sensing his apprehension at the thought of either someone else buying his underwear or the thought of "modern" clothes, "they're all clothes you're already used to wearing."

Steve tried not to show just how relieved he was, but failed. Apartment _and_ clothes that he was used to? There had to be a catch, though…

"Now, according to our esteemed leader, I am at your service for the rest of the day. There are some things in here that you don't know how to work. You probably need to go get some food, as that's the one thing we hadn't already taken care of beyond some bare essentials…"

He knew it. The catch was "modern gizmo lessons", something he wanted to put off as long as possible. Now that she was here, presumably ready to teach, he couldn't really avoid it. "What things don't I know how to work?" he asked, mentally preparing himself for the answer to be nothing short of "everything except the light switches" as he stared out the window.

Holly suddenly found herself glad she'd brought that little present. Instead of a goodwill gesture, it could be used as a bribe. She pulled the ten page document containing the instructions to various pieces of technology out of her bag. "If we don't get through this list, you won't know how to use this," she said with a sly smile, handing him the small box wrapped in blue and green wrapping paper. Anyone who was even remotely up to date with technology could immediately guess what the package was in general, but she watched him with anticipation as he began to unwrap the gift after she'd assured him it was alright.

A present? No one had given him a present since... Well, it had been quite a long time. As he peeled away the paper, he caught sight of the top of the box inside. He had no idea what a "Blu-ray disc" was, but he opted to keep going. When he saw the title of a familiar movie on the box, he didn't know if he would be able to keep his composure. The last time he'd seen _Gone with the Wind_ was right about the last time he'd seen _The Wizard of Oz_…with Bucky in the theater. "This is a little small to be a film reel, especially one of a movie this long. And where's the sound tape?" he asked, turning the box over in his hand to see if it was bigger than it looked. There was some kind of membrane around the box keeping him from opening it…

She motioned for him to hand the box back over to her. "You're right," she began as she used her nails to peel away the plastic wrapping and stickers from the edges of the box before opening it. Pulling the disc free from its place in the center of the back panel, she turned it over so the shiny side caught the morning light and cast rainbows on the walls. "This is too small to be a film reel, and the sound tape _is_missing. The movie, sound and all, is contained in this disc. There's a…" Did they have lasers in the Forties? "There's a special light in that player over there that can read this. It baffles _me _that it can work, but I simply accept that it does. If you take that general attitude towards most of the things I'm going to show you, this will all go a lot easier. Now, one of the things on this list is how to work that player and the television mounted on the wall over there. If you let me show you, I'll make you some popcorn and you can watch this when we've gone through the list." She gently put the disc back in the box.

Steve looked around the woman in front of him at the large, strange black rectangle hanging on the wall with two smaller boxes on the table underneath it. "T-That's a television?"

Over the next two hours, Holly patiently went over the huge document filled with instructions on how to operate everything that Steve didn't immediately recognize. Lesson one was how to operate the television, cable box, and Blu-ray player. All the smaller rectangles with strange buttons were certainly daunting, but suddenly became less so when she promised to not only leave the directions with him, but that half the buttons were ones he'd never have occasion to push. With practice, she assured, he'd get the hang of it in no time. He might even find a show he might like and decide to record. _You can record things off the television to watch later?_

Lesson number two was all about the laptop computer. S.H.I.E.L.D. had set up some sort of electronic mailbox for him. Not that he understood what all that entailed, but once she showed him the section of directions that dealt with it, he was able to log into the system. Immediately, he found a message from Miss Morgan containing a strange string of letters and numbers underlined and in blue text. Showing him how to "click", he realized that she'd sent him a song, "You Belong to Me" by Jo Stafford. She gently explained that the song came out about ten years after he went down, but that didn't mean he couldn't like it. And he did. And if there weren't enough ways to watch a picture, there was this thing called Netflix that would deliver more discs like _Gone with the Wind_ to his mailbox! He could even click the little blue "play" icon if the movie had one that would let him watch it without having to wait!

Lesson number three entailed learning about having to _not_ use a percolator to make coffee and this little white box called a microwave. When she told him that the refrigerator didn't require him to put ice in nor had a large cooling tower on top, he took a step back. They'd internalized the cooling system? It was certainly more aesthetically pleasing… Steve couldn't help but think sadly how many of these inventions his friend Howard Stark had a hand in inventing. He hadn't seen any cars that floated above the road like the one that floated-but-didn't at the World Expo, but that didn't mean there weren't any. It certainly seemed like a good idea.

He seemed relieved when he realized that the table beneath the television had a top that opened to reveal a record player. It was even a record player that looked to be almost as old as he was. This was something he knew how to operate, unlike that portable phone she said he could carry around with him outside the apartment.

Holly scribbled something on top of the directions she'd made up for him before picking up her bag and making for the door. "My cell phone number's on top of those directions if you get stuck."

Steve looked over at her with a look she could have sworn was one of being let down, before picking up his new copy of _Gone with the Wind_. "You said something about popcorn?"

Oh shit! She'd forgotten! Covering her mouth with her hand, she dropped her purse onto the desk. "I did promise popcorn. There's some already in your new kitchen. Wanna dazzle me with your command of the microwave?" She held out her hand and motioned towards the kitchen. When he hesitantly walked past her and into the kitchen, she followed him and pulled a single bag of popcorn out of a box in the pantry. She made quick work of the plastic wrapper and handed it to him, careful to point out the cooking time.

He didn't know when he was more nervous – when he jumped out of a plane into a cloud of gunfire or at this moment seventy years later as he used a microwave for the first time. Two and a half minutes later, he was rewarded with perfectly cooked and buttered popcorn fresh from the bag that he poured into a blue glass bowl that Holly had produced from one of the cabinets before taking a bottle of water from her. Upon returning to the living room, he quickly peeked at the directions before inserting the disc into the player and turning the television to accept the feed.

When she saw his back turned to her, she quickly pulled a S.H.I.E.L.D. folder from her bag and set it on the table on top of the closed laptop. Exhaling quietly, she suddenly felt better. He needed this, whether he knew it or not.

He took it back. He was definitely more nervous when he jumped out of the plane in the former scenario, but this new one he wasn't sure of. Jump out of a plane amidst gunfire…or ask a pretty girl to watch an old movie that she probably has no interest in? Probably the latter at this juncture. Bucky had always arranged a date for Steve. He'd never asked. Then he…got bigger and didn't have time to ask. "Miss Morg-" The words died on his lips when she raised a brown eyebrow at him. "Holly?"

"Yes?"

"Y-You probably don't, but I still wanted to ask…" His palms began to sweat. Dammit Rogers, you can lead troops into battle, but you can't ask a girl to sit with you? She may love this movie! "D-Do you want to have some of this popcorn and watch…"

Sensing the palpable awkwardness, she smiled and decided to help a fella out. "I would love some popcorn, and do you really have to ask a girl to watch her favorite movie?"

Steve resisted the urge thank his maker out loud, both for her willingness to stay and for her choice in favorite movies. He watched with fascination as she plopped down beside the left arm of the sofa and pulled some sort of lever to make a footrest pop out before popping a single piece of popcorn in her mouth. He selected the option that said "play movie" and was quickly rewarded with the familiar "A Selznick International Picture" written on an old-timey sign as the opening credits began playing. As the camera panned down onto the house, he sighed happily. "Looks like something out of a painting."

"I know," Holly agreed, popping another piece into her mouth as she smiled at him.

If only Bucky could see him now, Steve mused. Hell, if even Peggy or Howard Stark could see him now. He'd found a female who didn't mind spending time with him! She was sitting on the same piece of furniture with him!

The credits continued to roll, the music taking a turn for the somber notes. Without thinking, Holly found herself closing her eyes and reciting the famous lines that scrolled up the screen just as she did every time she saw the movie. "There was a land of Cavaliers and Cotton Fields called the Old South. Here in this pretty world, Gallantry took its last bow. Here was the last ever to be seen of Knights and their Ladies Fair, of Master and of Slave. Look for it only in books for it is no more than a dream remembered, A Civilization gone with the wind."

Steve smiled sadly hearing her soft voice reading the lines lamenting a bygone era. Were there any poems like that about…his time? His was as surely as much of a bygone era as the antebellum South was, despite the fact that this apartment's decor begged to differ. "There was a land of GI's and Ebbetts Field called the Second World War. Here in this seemingly bleak world, the War brought us out of a Depression. Here was the last ever to be seen of Captain America and his Peggy Fair, of Allies and Axis. Look for it only on newsreels for few now alive still remember, a civilization gone with…"

"If ya don't care what folks says about this family, I does. I has told ya an' told ya that ya can always tell a lady by the way she eats in front folks like a bird, and I ain't aimin' for ya to go to Mister John Wilkeses an' eat like a field hand an' gobble like a hog." Holly almost recited the next line, before realizing she might have interrupted Steve's train of thought. She quickly hunched her shoulders down and watched the rest of the movie in silence, getting up only to use the bathroom and get a bottle of water.

Steve quietly shut the door behind Holly as she left several hours later. He was oddly proud of himself. He'd watched an entire movie with a dame, and the only reason she got up was the call of nature! She didn't get up and _leave_. That had happened more than once, sadly.

He made his way to the small desk by the window, quickly noticing a folder with the S.H.I.E.L.D. emblem lying on top of the off-white computer that hadn't been there when she closed it after their Netflix lesson. Pulling out a chair, he sat down and took a deep breath. Holly had to have left the folder when he wasn't looking. His fingers ghosted over a note on yellow sticky paper stuck to the front:

"I figured you'd eventually ask, so I went ahead and brought these for you. My specialty is anticipating people's needs before they ask. If you ever get around to watching an old television show calledM*A*S*H (it's about an Army field hospital in Korea in the 1950s, order the discs from Netflix), look for a character called Radar. That's what I feel like I do every day. If you need me for anything at all, just call. –Holly"

He cautiously opened it, the faces of his old comrades popping off their personnel summaries. His heart sinking a little more each time he saw "DECEASED" stamped in big red letters below the pictures.

Suddenly, he found himself face to face with Peggy's personnel summary. His heart skipped a beat when hers only said "RETIRED" instead of "DECEASED". Looking at her birthday, he realized she was about to turn ninety-three, only two years younger than really was. He continued to scan the page that contained her current address and telephone number. He looked over at the cordless land line phone that Holly helped him set up (and he recorded a rather awkward answering machine message) and then back at her page. If he called her, what would he say? What would he do? Maybe he should sleep on it…

The next page in the folder was Howard Stark's. Howard had passed on, too. He set that page aside, on top of Peggy's. He found himself suddenly staring at a younger man who bore a striking resemblance to Howard. The page said "Tony Stark". There was no mistaking who this man's father was. Reading down through the man's list of credentials, he couldn't help but notice that this man was clearly every bit as smart as his old man… At the bottom of the page was mention of an "Iron Man" suit. So this is what Holly was talking about the other day. He would _definitely _have to ask her about it now. He set the page back down on the table in the pile where he picked it from, rubbing his chin in thought. Standing up quickly, he grabbed his jacket. He needed some air.

* * *

**Author's Note:**Well here we are, an actual chapter. I have had this written for a while now. Due to my work schedule (two jobs), I won't be updating this quickly normally. I've got a good bit of this story written, but it's in pieces. I do want to make a YouTube playlist for this story like I did for Memory Lane, but I just haven't had the time to get around to that yet.

Alright, so now that the obligatory "Steve is awake and can make his own coffee" bit is out of the way, we can get along to some plot development. I've got the next chapter mostly written. There are a couple of places where I've got a note to go back and insert something here and there, but the framework is there. Would y'all like me to do what I did last time (for my return readers) and send little teaser bits as review responses for those who review? I've got some exciting bits. Can't wait to hear what you think.

As always, only Holly is mine. I'm just borrowing Marvel / Disney / Stan Lee's toys. I did borrow bits of dialogue from the end of Captain America: The First Avenger to place things in context. Thanks again to**TrickPhotography **for all her beta help.


	3. Chapter Two

**Author's note is at the**** end.****  
**

**Chapter Two**

_Once upon another time  
Before I knew which life was mine  
Before I left the child behind me  
I saw myself in summer nights  
And stars lit up like candle light  
I make my wish but mostly I believed..._

Over the next couple days, Holly didn't see much of Steve if she saw him at all. She'd seen him around S.H.I.E.L.D. several times as he went back and forth to his handful of ordered meetings with various departments as part of his crash-course on his new time, but he never stopped to talk to her. She couldn't exactly blame him, though. She hadn't exactly looked like the most approachable person in the world. With the super-soldier up and walking around, Fury had poured gasoline on the fire under her ass to get Steve's new suit fabricated and ready for use. She hadn't spent this much time hopped up on caffeine and adrenaline since her final weeks in college.

As her computer screen faded to black, she looked at her reflection. She blew a raspberry and sighed. She definitely looked better during those final sleepless nights of college. It made perfect sense, though. In college, especially at the end, she had someone to look pretty _for_. Huffing loudly, she jiggled the mouse to bring back up her design program while gently reminding herself that those days were long gone. She'd sleep when she was dead.

* * *

Holly poked her head out of her laboratory door. "Doctor Shaw, a word please?" she called, looking in the direction of the middle-aged therapist in a dark grey suit.

James Shaw stopped mid-step and turned toward the young consultant. He'd been able to crack every other S.H.I.E.L.D. employee at their mandatory pre-employment screening…except Holiday Morgan and Director Fury himself. Could it be that she was finally ready to trust him? "And what can I do for you, Miss Morgan?" he asked, leaning casually on her doorframe in an effort to instill trust in the moment.

"I've been meaning to ask you how Captain Rogers is progressing. I know he wasn't too thrilled about the prospect of talking about his feelings." She folded her arms across her cream v-necked sweater and smiled expectantly.

He quickly straightened his red tie. "Now you of all people should know that I can't go into…"

"Specifics, I know. I wasn't asking for them," she added quickly, face scrunching up in thought as she searched for the desired words. "I uh… I see a lot of my late grandfather in him. He had nightmares about seeing an internment camp until the day he died, but never sought any kind of professional help."

"Not many at all did. It wasn't exactly considered the most 'manly' thing to do at the time."

Holly nodded. "I know. That's part of the reason I wanted to check up on St—Captain Rogers."

The slip didn't get by Doctor Shaw. The therapist decided to tuck that little tidbit away to use in his next session with the Captain. Had he made a friend? "Well, without saying anything I shouldn't, I can tell you that he's still hesitant to open up, but you probably guessed that. I'm slowly prying information out of him, but it's a tough process." He sighed heavily. "As much as I may hope to help, there are a lot of things that Captain Rogers has to do on his own. I can teach him how to channel what he's feeling, but I can't take those feelings away. His old life, and almost all of the people in it, are gone. He'll never be the same person he was before Project Rebirth."

She tore her dark eyes away from his green ones, beginning to stare at the tiled floor instead. "I know," she said dejectedly.

He cocked his head to the side, lowering his gaze in an effort to recapture hers. "Just like you're not the same person you were before the Afghanistan incident…"

Holly snapped her head up, shooting the kindly Bostonian a warning glare. "You're right. I'm not the same person I was. Then, I was a naïve twenty-three year old who was blindly in love. I took the pills, shed the baggage, and got on with my life," she growled as she went on the defensive. Suddenly, her ire softened when she remembered why she wanted to talk to him in the first place. "I just want to make sure Steve can get on with his life, too. After all he's done for all of us, I just want to help him if I can."

James Shaw raised an eyebrow as he tried to suppress a smile. Had he finally found the weak spot in Holly's exterior?

"Oh no," she began, wagging a finger at him. "Don't you start analyzing me. For the record, I am _not_ in love with Captain Rogers. What part of 'he reminds me of my grandfather' would indicate that?"

He began to clear his throat to conceal a laugh when an idea hit him. "What would you be willing to do to help him?"

"Is that some kind of trick question?" When she saw that the doctor was indeed serious, she shrugged. "Anything I can, I suppose. What do you have in mind?"

"I hear that you may know a certain Peggy Carter."

Holly began to absentmindedly gnaw on the inside of her lower lip. "I can count on one hand the number of times that I've been in the same room with her over the years. She's friends with my grandmother, not me."

"I only bring it up because Captain Rogers mentioned that you gave him her file. He knows she's alive. He's debated calling her, but hasn't. I think that seeing her again would help with his recovery."

She nodded slowly. "I will uh… I'll make some phone calls and see what I can work out. I'll let you know when I've got something."

"Thank you, Miss Morgan," the therapist said with a satisfied smile. "I'll bring up the idea in our session this afternoon."

When Doctor Shaw was safely in the elevator down the hall, Holly rolled her eyes and flopped down into her black leather chair behind her desk. She let her head drop down to the glass top with a thud before letting out a groan of frustration. What in the hell had she just agreed to do?

She hadn't lied about not knowing the famous Peggy Carter that well. The only time she seemed to see the tough Brit was at funerals. In fact, the last time she saw her was at her grandfather's funeral almost four years prior. As she began to think about how best to go about making arrangements, if any were to be made, a small smile crept across her face. She could give Steve a tearful, stereotypical Hollywood reunion if she kept the whole thing a surprise from Peggy.

However, in order to do that, she'd have to contact the only person in the world that she liked less than her grandmother – Hugh Chapman, one of Peggy's grandsons. Holly suddenly felt bile begin to rise in her throat at the thought of the (then) thirty year old virgin that tried to pick her up at her own grandfather's funeral. Judd Apatow had to have written _The Forty Year Old Virgin_ for this man. He probably had little Captain America action figures, too.

"He'd better have the time of his fucking life with her," Holly grumbled as she scrolled through her phone's contact list. She whimpered as she clicked on "HUGH CHAPMAN – DO NOT ANSWER" and the line began to ring.

* * *

"Ah, Miss Morgan, still dressing like my mother, I see," Tony quipped, eyeing the petite brunette's older styled blue boat-necked dress with a flared skirt as he entered the main lobby of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s headquarters.

Holly sighed, rolling her eyes. She didn't even have to turn around to identify the familiar voice. "Can I help you, Stark?" she asked with a huff.

"Now, _Morgan_," he began, imitating her irritated tone, "is that any way to say hello to me?" The shit-eating grin he was sporting was a mile wide.

Steve Rogers looked on with wide blue eyes. He'd seen the billionaire's picture in the file Holly left for him, but this was the first time that he personally laid eyes on the man. Physically, he was most definitely his father's son, of that there could be no mistake. The younger man also definitely had his father's finesse with women…well, mostly. He'd seen Peggy roll her eyes at Howard much like he just watched Holly roll hers at Tony.

"Oh, because saying that I dress like your mother is a more appropriate greeting? I don't think so." She turned back to Steve. "Come on, Steve."

"Don't I get a hug before you go?" Tony taunted.

"No," she said emphatically.

"Your loss," he replied with a shrug, stepping into the open elevator.

"Y-You know Howard's son?" Steve asked slowly and awkwardly after the elevator doors closed in front of the billionaire. Despite the fact that Howard Stark had been dead for almost twenty years and his son was in his forties, Steve couldn't quite bring himself to see Tony as his own man yet. He was still "Howard's Son". When Holly nodded in the affirmative, he couldn't help but look at her with an air of incredulity.

"I knew Howard, too," she admitted sadly, remembering his funeral. "Not as well as I know Tony, but I knew him."

"H-How?" He still couldn't believe it. Clearly Walt Disney had it right – it's a small world after all. His past and present were colliding harder than the atoms in the supercollider he'd seen in a special on the History Channel when he couldn't fall asleep.

"It's a long story. Follow me." Holly chuckled and walked over to the elevators. Pulling her keycard free from its place clipped to her blouse, she swiped it in the reader beside one of the cars. The door opened, revealing a completely blacked out elevator car that Steve had never seen before. Once her friend was safely beside her in the ominous looking space, she pressed a button on the wall marked STO1. "How closely did you look at your own uniform?" she asked as the elevator lurched upwards.

He began quickly combing through the recesses of his mind, trying to think of anything possibly unusual about the familiar suit. "Was there something I should have noticed?"

"I guess that's one thing that hasn't changed in seventy years. People didn't check the tags on the inside of clothes then, either." She shook her head. Her grandmother had taught her to meticulously check the tags on her clothes for care instructions. Despite their more than comfortable fiscal outlook, her grandparents were still mindful of what happened in October 1929. You didn't waste things, and you certainly didn't run the risk of ruining a $300 "dry clean only" skirt because you put it in the washer.

"I'm not sure that I follow. What does a tag inside my old uniform have to do with how you know the Starks?" he inquired as the black doors opened, revealing a stainless steel paneled room lit only with emergency lights. He watched cautiously as she flipped a switch on the wall just outside of the elevator door, flooding the room with bright fluorescent lighting.

"My great-grandfather, Amos Morgan, started Morgan Defense and Armor in 1913 when he was twenty-four. After seeing what new sorts of methods we'd learned to tear each other to bits through World War I, he began figuring out ways to keep us together," she began, making her way over to a large panel marked "SHIELD 2" on the wall. "He met Howard Stark in 1942 when they realized they were in a bidding war for the same lump of metal."

His eyes lit up as she pulled the panel out from the wall and produced his shield. He watched her right bicep flex as she pulled the shield from its resting place in the metal drawer. "Vibranium," he confirmed as he slid his arm through the straps on the back of his instantly recognizable emblem for the first time in too many years. It felt like coming home.

Holly couldn't help but smile widely as he was clearly lost in thought, reacquainting himself with an old friend. She stepped back over to the wall and opened another panel, this time removing his suit from the drawer and placing it on the table in the middle of the room. She cleared her throat to bring him back into the present. "Now, the suit." She slid off the straps that held the gun holster and belt before gently opening the front of the suit via the series of heavy-duty snaps that peppered the right side. "See the tag?" she asked, pointing at the small tag that read "CAPT. ROGERS" followed by "DO NOT REMOVE" on the back of the neck.

He'd seen that tag a dozen times and thought it absolutely pointless to even have one. The damned thing rubbed the back of his neck wrong, but it said not to take it off. Ever one to follow orders over personal comfort, he'd left it. "I see it."

"Did you ever flip it over?" She bit her lip in anticipation of his answer. Her grandfather told her long ago about what the back of this tag said, but he was never able to show her. The fact that the suit still clung to its owner at the bottom of a sheet of ice until very recently was a good excuse. The moment Captain Rogers had been found and brought back to New York, she began waiting impatiently for the wet and freezing suit to be removed and placed here so she could look for herself. Agent Coulson had come with her to help her "catalog the belongings" and shared in her childish delight when she saw the message was still sewn into the back of the tag.

"No, I never saw a reason to." Steve quickly caught the hint at the sight of her inability to hide her excitement that maybe the answer was beneath the ever-infuriating tag. He reached down to touch the tag, only to instantly recoil. The room suddenly felt cold as the air left his lungs. The suit felt colder. It felt just like it did in the cold, dark cockpit of the plane.

Holly's joy at sharing this with her friend quickly turned into unmitigated sorrow. She recognized the look on his face. It was the same look she'd seen on her grandfather's face after one of his many nightmares that he always swore were nothing. He'd seen the remnants of several concentration camps as the Allies marched across Germany, but refused to talk about it. "Ending a war doesn't heal all the wounds," he'd told her shortly before his death. "S-Steve?" she asked hesitantly as she threaded her right hand through his left and squeezed tightly. When she saw him exhale heavily, she shifted her eyes toward the battered uniform. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have…"

He cut her off with a curt shake of his head. "It's fine," he lied, pulling his hand free of hers abruptly and shoving it into his pants pocket. "It's just rather chilly in here."

And just like that, she realized, some things don't change. She knew he lied to her just like her grandmother knew when her late husband was lying to her about his dreams. He'd even used the same tone as her grandfather when he dismissed his feelings. She couldn't exactly fault either of them for growing up in an era when men didn't cry or say how they _felt_. "Anyway," she began as she turned over the tag, "Howard Stark wasn't the only civilian contractor called in on 'Project Rebirth'."

Steve squinted, barely able to make out the words formed by the faded stitching. Despite the fact that he was using all available resources not to start shivering or bolt from the room (because not only was he a man, he was _Captain America_), he smirked when he read "If you want it blown up, call a Stark. If you want to keep a Stark from blowing it up, call a Morgan". "Did I ever meet him?" he asked softly. Secretly, he hoped he hadn't, because it would be truly embarrassing not to remember.

"I don't think so, no. He would have told someone. When it came time to give you a uniform, especially in light of what happened with Erskine and you being the 'army of one' super-soldier, Howard knew he needed to borrow the one set of eyes that could make sure your gear was top of the line. My great-grandfather's only request was that somewhere down the line Howard had to use the Vibranium in some defensive capacity." She almost teared up at the memory of her grandfather telling her all of this over the years. The only reason she didn't cry was that she knew she had an image to maintain, and getting misty-eyed over a memory wasn't going to help that.

"And I happened to pick that shield."

"That you did. Apparently when Howard told him about your choice of shield and what it was made of, they were about to pack up this suit and put it on a plane to Europe. Amos stopped them while he had my great-grandmother stitch this tag together." Holly rubbed the tag absentmindedly between her fingers with a smile. "I don't know if Howard ever even noticed it."

"If he did, he didn't say anything to me about it," he replied, hoping that his words were of some comfort. "So how do you know Tony?"

She laughed. "The first time I met Tony Stark, I was five years old and he was twenty. My grandfather, Michael, and Howard used to meet once or twice a year out in the desert and have what they liked to call 'Desert Parties'. Howard would bring his latest explosive and my grandfather would bring his latest defense against it. This particular party was about a year before Howard died, the last one they ever had. He brought Tony and my grandfather brought me, along with a set of very strong earplugs and a tiny helmet."

Steve couldn't help but chuckle softly at the mental image of Holly as little more than a toddler puttering around in the desert with his old friend and his son. "Wasn't that rather dangerous?"

"I never said it was the smartest thing my grandfather ever did, but let's just say that Howard never managed to destroy a piece of Morgan armor. At the time, my father was running the company. Poppy," she paused and cringed at her use of the term of endearment for her grandfather. "retired fifteen years earlier, but wouldn't let my dad try to beat Howard. He always said that would happen after he died." Holly pushed herself off of her leaning position against the table that still held Steve's uniform and walked to the other side of the room. Tears were forming and there was nothing she could do to stop them now. Damn him for asking about all this, but he had a right to know. "H-Howard made Tony shake my tiny sand-encrusted hand and wished 'the two future captains of industry' all the luck in the world. 'The two of you should work _better _than Mike and I because Tony'll have a lady to keep him in line', he said."

When she trailed off, he slowly stepped towards her. "But you're not running the company now."

Hearing him walking in her direction, she held out a hand behind her to stop him. "A _year_ after that party, Howard and his wife were killed in a car accident. Ironically, a year later, so were mine. Tony was old enough to run a company. I was seven. The company went to my older cousin to keep it in the family for as long as possible. I was just the little girl that ran around the R&D areas trying on helmet prototypes, constantly asking how they could be better."

His heart began to break for her. Holly and Tony – the kids who had everything planned out for them. They were supposed to do all but rule the world together. His traitorous mind, fueled by some of the more romantic titles in his Netflix queue, couldn't help but wonder if Howard's comment about Tony having "a lady to keep him in line" didn't mean something more. Could Howard have wanted his son to marry the much younger woman as part of a business merger? He dismissed the idea as quickly as it came to him. He'd been watching too many movies lately… "And did you make them better?"

Holly wiped away the traces of the unshed tears and turned around. "How do you think S.H.I.E.L.D. found me?" she asked, sniffling.

* * *

_February 19, 2006_

_10:15 pm_

_Los Angeles, California_

Holly grunted in frustration. This reaction wasn't going at all the way she needed it to. This project was due in three days. If this experiment worked, she would not only complete her project, but if her theory was correct, and her theories generally were, she could one-up Kevlar and earn herself a very nice place in her great-grandfather's company. If it didn't work, well, she may have to break down and cry for the first time in years.

There were times she mentally kicked herself for thinking she was more than just a pretty face and deciding that she could somehow complete a bachelors and a masters in Materials Engineering. Her grandmother attributed it to pure spite for her, of course. Everything she did seemed to garner that reaction from the family matriarch. She wanted to stop taking piano lessons at the age of seventeen? It was to spite her grandmother. When she wanted to go to college and major in something other than "home economics" (did they even _have_ anything like that anymore?), it was to spite her grandmother. She'd only been twenty-one for eighteen hours, but she'd already received a call from her old-fashioned grandmother wondering when she was going to "stop piddling about in a laboratory and find a man".

Tony Stark sauntered down the tiled hallways of Boelter Hall on the UCLA campus, two paper bags in hand. The nice little redhead he'd run into in the entrance way seemed to know all about the next generation of Morgan haunting the labs late at night. She was supposed to be at dinner with her loving grandparents for her birthday. He'd even been invited, which he attributed to a lingering desire by Mrs. Morgan to have her granddaughter become Mrs. Stark. He couldn't help but think Howard would have approved. His son making the weapons, the great-granddaughter of his counterpart in the defense industry making the armor. One-stop shopping.

He grinned as his thoughts turned to the younger Morgan. When in the _hell_ did she grow up? More than that, though… When did she manage to achieve the body of a cheerleader? He made a quick mental note to mark that down in the "fantasy list". It seemed like only yesterday she was the pint-sized tyke Michael Morgan equipped with ear plugs and a helmet and set down to run around the desert while his old man and her (even older) old man watched things blow up. He should feel like a lech. He was twenty and she was five at the time.

A month ago, Michael had shown him a picture of her from her cousin's, the current CEO of Morgan Defense and Armor, wedding. She most definitely was _not_ the five year old he remembered. She was a (then) twenty year old leggy blonde. Children sometimes have hair color changes as they get older, but he was willing to bet (owing to his experience) that her particular shade of blonde came from a bottle, possibly the same place the light tan came from, too.

The billionaire couldn't help but chuckle. When he last talked to Michael Morgan earlier that morning, he'd been told the birthday celebration had been postponed. Holly had a project that was giving her trouble and was going to have to stay in the lab and work on it. In that instant, he realized she may just be more like him than he could ever have thought. He'd lost count of the number of nights he'd spent in a lab at MIT doing something similar in hopes that Howard might be proud. Work or not, no one deserved to be alone on their birthday, especially someone as smart and beautiful as the illustrious Holiday Morgan.

As she carefully assembled the necessary components to start the reaction again, her thoughts suddenly turned to Tony Stark. When she'd been told that the CEO of Stark Industries had been invited to her twenty-first birthday dinner, she couldn't believe it. She'd met the man a handful of times early in her life (at the last Desert Fire Party, at the funeral for Howard Stark and his wife), but she'd never given more than a passing thought to the man. She couldn't help but think, however, that her grandmother was trying to set her up with the younger Stark.

She reached into her pocket and resumed the song playing on her iPod – ELO's "Eldorado". Lighting the Bunsen burner after making sure the materials were safely in the crucible, she began to sing along to the familiar song. "Say goodbye, the city's heroes sing, bird on the wing feel, feel so free through the life upon the rooftop haze, all the cheating and the broken days. So through it all I see there's nothing left for me."

Unbeknownst to Holly, Tony Stark stood outside the door into the brightly lit laboratory and peered into the window. She was listening to music, some serious prog rock if he correctly guessed the tune, he noticed as he quietly opened the door. Once he noticed the burner was on and she didn't react at all to him opening the door, he knew he had to get her attention or she'd burn herself.

"So I will stay, I'll not be back, Eldorado. I will be free of the world, Eldorado. Sitting here on top of everywhere, what do I care. Days never end, I know the voyage's end will soon be here, no eternal life is here for me. And now I found the key to the eternal dream," Holly sang as she swayed in time to the music. Her grey yoga pants were neatly tucked into the top of her tan UGG boots, doing nothing to hide the shape of her legs from the playboy's view. Her oversized blue Beatles shirt hung loosely around her frame, almost entirely covering her backside.

Tony shook his head, a shame, as he set the bags down on the stone countertop of a nearby lab bench. He watched as she gently picked up the scorching crucible, pouring the contents into a dish and began staring at it. He took that moment as his cue to knock on the cabinet above the bench.

She ripped the white earbuds out of her ears and whirled around at the sound of knuckles meeting wood. Placing a hand over her heart in a vain attempt to slow her breathing, she turned off the iPod and set it safely away from her experiment. Her eyes never left the well dressed man in front of her. "Mister Stark," she began warily. "You scared the hell out of me."

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his pinstripe suit pants. "Tony, please. You watched me bury 'Mister Stark'. Besides, didn't I tell you then to call me Tony?"

Grabbing a pair of tweezers, she reached into the dish and pulled out the now hardened polymer and set it on a sterile piece of gauze. "That was almost fifteen years ago, _Tony_," she said, emphasizing his name as she carried the gauze to a scale.

He rolled his dark eyes. "Don't I know it," he muttered. "If I understand things correctly, and I usually do, you're supposed to be at Café La Boheme down on Santa Monica Boulevard right about now having your first legal glass of wine with your loving grandparents and myself. Instead, you're in a dismal lab working on a project? That's not a good excuse at all," he quipped, beginning to unload the bags. "I mean, if you want to blow off the family, that's fine. But I'm beginning to think that you just don't like me. I'm deeply wounded, you know."

She rolled her eyes and continued to work. "This project is due Friday. I've got to get it done."

"Lemme guess," Tony interjected as he continued setting up the nearby lab bench like a dinner table. "If this polymer you're working on works out the way you hope, you're going to get more than just a good grade, right?"

Holly dropped the piece onto the scale and turned to face the unwanted intruder, hand on her hip. "What are you doing here, Tony?" she asked impatiently. "I've got work to do."

"If you couldn't get to the restaurant, I thought I'd bring the restaurant to you." He stepped back to reveal several to-go dishes, a bottle of champagne, and two flutes. "That way, I can eat, you can eat, and I don't feel like you're blowing me off."

Despite herself, she smiled. Here was a man who by all rights shouldn't care at all. In truth, she wasn't trying to blow anyone off. This project meant so much that she didn't really even have time to go out for her own birthday. Her anger quickly dissipated by the tempting smell of food.

"I didn't know what you wanted, but I've never met a woman that turned down seared sea scallops." He smiled when her stomach began to growl. "And I'm guessing that I'm not too far off the mark. And as for why I'm here, if you're anything like me, you start working and completely forget to eat. I've got an assistant to remind me, but even then I don't always remember." Tony grabbed the bottle of Moët and began to pull back the foil.

She turned back to the scale to retrieve her material, knowing full well that she wasn't apt to get much more work done tonight. Her breath caught in her throat and her hand flew to cover her open mouth. 1.527 grams. Her experiment had worked. The weight of the material was spot on with her calculations of its yield (and hopefully strength).

The loud bang of the cork popping out of the bottle echoed through the almost empty lab. "And going by that look on your face, I'd venture to say that you just made a breakthrough in polymers, but you don't want anyone to know that yet." He poured two glasses of champagne and opened the to-go box prepared for him – steak with garlic mashed potatoes, glazed green beans, and balsamic steak sauce. Just as he was about to sit down, he happened to see the younger woman darting across the room in a tan, grey, and blue blur, only to have her wrap her arms around his neck. "I take it whatever you were working on just clicked?"

She nodded shyly, slowly removing her body from his person. Shit, that man smelled good. And of course, he looked absolutely delectable in that black pinstriped suit. Maybe being set up with him wasn't a bad thing. She had no idea why, but leaping into Tony Stark's arms in joy seemed like a perfectly acceptable response to her possibly discovering a lighter substance with the ability to be woven into fabrics that would eliminate the need for armored plating in uniforms. That was an achievement, right? There was also the matter of thanking him for bringing a five star restaurant to her lab for no other reason than he knew what it was like to forget to eat… "Something like that," Holly acknowledged with a smile, blushing slightly as Tony pulled out a battered old stool and motioned for her to sit.

"Then you can tell me all about it while we have Café La Boheme in a materials science lab." He handed her one of the now full champagne flutes. "Happy birthday to the woman that might keep me in business if her little experiment is anything like what I think it is," he toasted with a wink, touching the rim of his glass to hers before taking a generous swig.

The pair fell into an easy conversation about the theory she was testing. The basic steps would more than suffice for her assignment, but with further experimentation and a bigger lab, she postulated that she could use her result to make an extremely durable and lightweight uniform for soldiers. The only person she'd been able to talk to about what she was doing in school was her grandfather, but even then, a lot of these newer techniques and newer technology went above and beyond his education. He'd left future development to the "young bucks" down in R&D before she was even born. Unlike her grandmother, her grandfather was immensely proud that his late son and daughter-in-law had produced such a smart child.

"Once you get that little hunk of material refined, you ought to bring it over sometime. We'll tool around with it and see if we can't get enough fabric made for me to shoot something at," Tony caught himself offering before he could stop himself, finishing off the remnants of his mashed potatoes and green beans. He quickly closed up the box and stuffed it back into one of the bags.

Holly broke out into a wide smile, looking more like a five year old whose parent just promised them their favorite toy than a twenty-one year old college senior who may have just made a breakthrough in uniform fabrics. "I'd really like that, but I'm not sure if I'd want it in Stark Industries' labs…"

"Of course not. It'd be on my private server in my lab at home. Your grandfather would rip me limb from limb if I let your first development go to my company," he said softly, pouring her the last bit of the champagne. As she gently sipped the bubbly liquid, he deposited the remnants of her long-finished meal into the bag as well.

"I-I should probably clean up," she said as she did her best not to let on that the combination of the champagne and the suddenly immensely attractive man that brought dinner was beginning to get to her. Jumping off the stool, she quickly disassembled the apparatus that held the crucible above the flame and shoved it into her drawer. Once the crucible was suitably cleaned, it joined its companions in the wooden drawer as well. As she wiped down her work area after tucking the piece of black polymer into a Ziploc bag in her messenger bag, the distinct smell of Tony Stark – a combination of fine scotch, a hint of a cigar, and absolutely intoxicating cologne – assaulted her nose. He was definitely very close behind her.

"You missed a spot," he offered in the form of a husky whisper in her ear, slowly taking the wet towel from her tiny hand after placing one hand on either side of her hips. She definitely needed to get those acrylic nails touched up, but the sudden desire to suck on that obvious pulse point on the side of her neck made him forget. Quickly wiping away at an imaginary spot of dirt, he put the towel back in her hand. He knew that his touch lingered much longer than it should have, but it didn't matter. He was soon rewarded with the shorter woman turning around between his arms.

"T-Tony, what is this?" she whispered, trying in vain to protest. When she could feel his breath on her lips, she realized she didn't want to protest anymore.

"You _have_ heard of a birthday kiss, haven't you?" he asked, gently pressing her up against the cool stone of the counter behind her as he slid his left knee between her legs. At her nod, he slowly pressed his lips to hers before sliding an arm around her waist and pulling her flush against him.

Before she could stifle it, she let out a soft whimper against his kiss. Holly quickly found herself fisting her hands in the lapels of his suit jacket, deepening the kiss with a quick flick of her tongue. She felt herself being lifted up to sit on the counter top, when suddenly her hipbone made sharp contact with the corner of the open adjacent drawer. She broke the kiss quickly and looked down to make sure nothing was seriously injured. When her eyes met Tony's again, she laughed softly. "I… We can't continue this in here."

"Mmm. And just what are you suggesting, madam?" Tony growled before attaching his lips to that pulse point he'd been admiring earlier.

Holly threw her head back in a sudden rush of pleasure and threaded her fingers through the dark hair at the nape of his neck. "I-I mean that there are too many sharp objects here, a-and on top of that, I don't exactly relish the thought of getting caught…" Realizing his mouth was now at that patch of skin below her ear, she gasped. "W-We need to get out of here."

"And just where do you suggest we go?"

The abrupt absence of his warm lips on her skin caused her neck to break out in patches of goose bumps. She shouldn't even suggest out loud what her traitorous brain was suggesting. She should not, under any circumstances, invite Anthony Edward Stark back to her apartment. The rational side of her mind began listing the laundry list of reasons why it was beyond a bad idea, but the chemicals exploding in her pleasure center were shouting from the rooftops that it was the best idea she'd ever had in her life, better than her theory for that piece of black mass in her bag. "M-My apartment isn't too far away. T-Take me to my car so I can drive it home, then follow me there."

He quickly lifted his head, their lust-darkened eyes met once more. "Lead on, Mac Duff."

When her alarm clock began shrieking at her at 8:15 am, Holly groaned loudly. As she slowly opened her eyes, she began wondering how in the world her inner thighs were sore and her throat hurt. Peeling back the covers and seeing her own naked form, it all came flooding back to her. She, Holiday Rae Morgan, had spent a glorious evening with Tony Stark. She shook her head with a pleased smile, raising an eyebrow when she caught sight of a tented piece of printer paper with her name on it perched on the other bed pillow. She reached over and unfolded it with a smile.

_Holly, _

_I must say, this is the first time in a long time that a woman has taken __me__ home. This is largely due to the fact that I prefer to sneak off to my work area in the basement and just wait for them to leave. I can't do that very well at someone else's house. Why am I telling you this? I have no idea. Speaking of taking me home, I must say Morgan, that was a beyond spectacular rendition of "Birthday Sex". Normally, I'm not one for encore performances, but in your case I may make an exception. _

_Now, I happen to know that you are free this Friday night. (You really shouldn't leave your planner open, especially when I personally know that you completed that nice little experiment last night.) Be at my house in Malibu at 7 and bring your new little piece of material. I've got a bottle of scotch with our names on it. _

_Tony_

Three days later, Holly pulled up into Tony's driveway. She nervously shifted her late model BMW into park. Just as before, the rational side of her brain was screaming, questioning why in the world she would come. Once again, the hormones swimming around her brain kept telling her she would be a fool not to come. There weren't many people that could virtually give her a limp just from one fun-filled night. She mentioned to her grandfather that Tony came to see her in the lab, but neglected to mention any subsequent activities. The man may be eighty-six, but that didn't mean he couldn't try to flay him alive. When he asked if Tony brought her anything for her birthday, she simply said "dinner". She didn't even dare to mention the kiss. Her grandmother would have a field day with it.

Using the number provided three days earlier, she'd texted Tony and mentioned that she'd never been much of a one for scotch, but if he was willing to make an exception, she could too. They'd continued to message each other back and forth over the next couple of days. Earlier that same day, he had the audacity to ask what kind of underwear she would be wearing so they wouldn't match. She'd replied that she liked how he was assuming he was going to get to see whatever she decided to throw on. In typical Tony fashion, he simply replied "What was that I said about an encore performance?"

She skipped class for the first time in her academic career at UCLA to pick out an outfit. After an hour of showering, makeup application, and straightening her curly hair while mentally combing through her entire wardrobe, she decided on a pair of dark skinny jeans, black stilettos, and a black sweater with three-quarter length sleeves that came down to the middle of her thighs. As for the underwear that Tony was so concerned about, she made a special trip to purchase a red balconet push-up bra and a matching thong.

With shaking breath, she killed the engine and grabbed her purse from the passenger seat. She reached into the large black hobo bag to make sure she hadn't forgotten her unnamed material. Sure enough, it was there, tucked safely in its plastic bag. She couldn't help but wonder just how much work they'd be doing. She exited the car and made her way up the handful of steps to the front door. Before she could knock, the door opened to reveal Tony Stark. She had to stop her jaw from dropping at the sight of a very dressed down version of the CEO. He sported a simple white tee shirt, dark blue jeans, and tennis shoes.

"See something you like?" he asked before moving to the side and ushering her into the mansion.

Clutching her purse strap, Holly turned back to face him with an astonished grin. "I-I've never seen you _not_ wearing a suit," she admitted shyly as he closed the door behind them.

"Did you bring your piece of…whatever you're going to call it?" he inquired with an adventurous grin on his face, quickly wiping the remaining engine gunk from his fingernails onto his jeans. Surely she'd never notice.

She quickly began to fumble through her bag for the Ziploc bag that was just sitting on the top. Her heart began to pound at the palpable awkwardness of the situation. She closed her eyes when she felt him approach her from behind and put his hands on her hips. When she finally found it, she handed it over to the genius with a shaking hand.

He gleefully snatched the plastic bag out of her hand before gently kissing her cheek. "Let's take this downstairs, let JARVIS start working his magic on it, and we can…"

"Jarvis?" she questioned, turning around in his arms to face him. "Who in the hell is Jarvis? Sounds like the name of a British butler."

"JARVIS, would you please say hello to Holly Morgan?" Tony called, looking up at the ceiling of the massive living room.

"Hello, Miss Morgan. Are you by any chance related to the Morgans of Morgan Defense and Armor?" a disembodied voice from the ceiling spoke suddenly, causing Holly to latch onto Tony rather tightly.

"Y-Yes I am," she stuttered, still holding tightly to the white tee shirt. She suddenly smelled that distinctly Tony smell from the other night, this time combined with a hint of sweat. She knew she was done for. Her bed had smelled just like that for twenty-four hours. She had an overwhelming desire to forget the polymer and insist Tony take her again right there in the living room before he grabbed her left hand and drug her down the stairs to his garage slash laboratory.

Tony stopped only to punch a code into the numbered buttons that appeared in the middle of the glass. Opening the door, he pulled her inside and let go of her hand. He walked over to a cluster of computer screens, plunked down her piece of material, and barked some commands at the ceiling before turning back to her. He couldn't help but laugh as she stood in the doorway, mouth agape, staring at the open room. "I think you and I are more alike than I thought, Morgan. Are you staring at the computers or the cars?"

"Cars," she said with a laugh, bringing her index finger up to her mouth and biting the newly filled in acrylic nail coyly as she stared at the dark blue Shelby Cobra across the vast room. "Cobra."

"Good eye." As JARVIS began scanning the polymer to create fabric, Tony crossed the room again quickly, scooping Holly up in his arms and began carrying her back up the stairs. "Can you drive a stick?"

"Nope. I don't have the slightest idea."

A deep rumbling laugh began coming from Tony's chest. "This is going to be fun," he said before leaning down and stealing a quick kiss.

* * *

**Author's**** Note:** Sorry this has taken me a long time to update. I've been working on serious plot development in later parts of the story. The good news is that we've met Tony. This happened to be a happy flashback, but don't count on too many of them being quite that happy. In reference to the date for the flashback (2006), I'm doing what I did in my previous story and basically have the year that the films in question came out be the year that the events took place (with the exception of the ending of Captain America), meaning that Iron Man took place in 2008. Just for your reference.

I don't own anything, except for my little Holly.

As always, let me know what you think. I've got a ton of people who have this story as a favorite / alert, but no one's leaving a review. (Except for BreezeInMonochromeNight, TheForrestGirl, and OCDgirl326, of course. Love y'all.) Am I doing a good job? A bad job? I know the story's still in its infancy as far as plot development goes, but any words of encouragement or "you could make this better" mean the world to me.

Thanks to TrickPhotography for catching my mistakes and BreezeInMonochromeNight for being a sounding board.

One last thing before I go, the song lyrics quoted at the beginning of this are from "Once Upon Another Time" by Sara Bareilles. Check it out.

Jen OUT!


	4. Chapter Three

**Author's Note:** Breaking with my tradition, I'm putting this first this time. I am sorry that it took me so long to update. I had most of this chapter already written, but my grandfather passed away somewhat unexpectedly. I had to go out of town for his funeral and didn't really feel much like writing. When I did step back in, I had all these great ideas for much later in the story that I wrote. (Review, and I'll send you a snippet.)

The next chapter is mostly written, thanks to my pledge not to start uploading the story before I had a good portion written. The ending of the next chapter (chapter four) will lead directly into the events of _Avengers_. I had to split _Avengers_ into two chapters because I looked down and said "holy cow, this is almost thirty pages".

A note on that front while I've got you all here. I made the decision not to include much from the film dialogue-wise in the story. What I did use, as you will see in the next chapter and the two chapters that cover that time period and the immediate aftermath, is there for a reason. Most of the events of _Avengers_ (in this story) are seen through Steve's eyes.

In other news, I have finally made a YouTube playlist for this story. This playlist will not only have the songs that I have in the chapters, but it will have other clips that I watched while writing or refer to in the story (for example, I've got the "for your consideration, the Jericho" scene from _Iron Man_ because there will come a time when I refer to it). I will be adding more as we go along. Check it out here after you remove the spaces: www . youtube playlist?list=PLjgjKHy4ofeD7d1-R6eJ_GWIiGkQz56sn

Song for this chapter is "Where Are We Now" by David Bowie (from his upcoming album). Also mentioned is Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It". (Don't judge me.)

As always, thanks to the always wonderful **TrickPhotography** for her efforts as beta and to **BreezeInMonochromeNight **for being a sounding board. I don't own anything except Holly. I can't wait to hear what you think!

Jen

* * *

Chapter Three

_A man lost in time,_

_Near KaDeWe._

_Just walking the dead._

_Where are we now?_

Holly sat calmly at her glass-topped desk, thankful that her computer screen faced the wall behind her. Thanks to Coulson's thought out "design input", all she had to do now was wait for the computer in the back to finish fabricating Captain Rogers's suit. Hopefully it would finish soon. Her warm flannel sheets on her bed were calling her name rather loudly. She rapidly rotated between the left and right mouse buttons as the virtual playing cards zoomed to their proper places between sips of coffee. Out of the corner of her brown eye, she happened to see Captain Rogers rounding the corner, seemingly searching for their fearless leader. She quickly minimized the window containing her game, suddenly unable to stifle a yawn.

Steve Rogers exited the elevator and cautiously approached her desk, unsure of why she was smiling at him. "D-Do you know if the director in, ma'am?" he asked cautiously after clearing his throat.

She quickly reached under her desk and pulled out a large brown paper bag, clutching it to her chest as she stood up. "While I'm refreshed by your manners, Captain, I believe that I told you when I showed you to your apartment not to 'ma'am' me."

"M-Miss Morgan, I'm sorry…"

She laughed softly, reassuring him that she wasn't mad for his slip. After all, what was that bit from _Pirates of the Caribbean_ when Elizabeth asked Will how many more times must she ask him to call her Elizabeth instead of Miss Swann, only for him to respond with "Once more" or something like that? Manners are still wonderful. "But to answer your question, no, he's not in. He'll be out watching Project Pegasus for the next couple of days. Is there anything I can help you with though?"

Steve shook his head with a shy smile. "No, I don't think so. I guess I'll be on my way. Thank you, though." A split second after he turned to leave, he heard the distinct clicking of high heels on the marble floor just before feeling a petite hand on his broad shoulder. "Is there anything I can do for _you_, Miss Morgan?" he asked with a sudden burst of confidence before widening his eyes and asking himself where that came from.

"Yes, actually," Holly said matter-of-factly, pressing the bag into the soldier's arms. "It dawned me as I was leaving your apartment last week that you had a record player and only two records. I listen to more than that in a day." She unrolled the top of the bag, revealing a dozen or so records and pointed inside. "The Piaf, Vera Lynn, Beethoven, and Marilyn Monroe ones are mine. I had a feeling that you'd like them, but I couldn't find those particular ones at the record store. No rush on getting them back to me. You can keep them until you find copies of your own. The rest of them are yours to keep, however."

A wide grin burst across his face. "T-they still have record stores? I didn't see any when I was walking around." He paused and shook his head. "I thought everyone had those… Those…" Unable to come up with the word "headphones", Steve pointed at his ear. He tucked the bag up under his arm. He felt lost, but after realizing that someone else was at least a familiar with "his" technology, he felt a little better.

"You just have to know where to look," she said with a wink as she patted him on the forearm. "If you'd like me to take you to the one I like to go to, I will. And the word you're looking for is 'headphones', although I think you meant to ask if I had an iPod." Holly reached back over to her desk and picked up a black rectangle. With the press of a button, the screen lit up. "It's an iPod and a phone rolled into one, an iPhone. They have good enough sound quality for walking around town, riding the bus, and that sort of thing. The songs are compressed from the original recordings, so the quality's not as good…" When she noticed him getting a somewhat glassy look in his eye, she stopped. "But the sound quality of records, especially if you have the right sound system, is beyond compare. I prefer them."

Steve turned to look out the window to the left of her desk, pondering her offer…and her. He was still a little raw about her part in the deception when he woke up, but if there was one thing he could empathize with, it was the need to follow orders from one's superior. He realized he couldn't be too mad at her. She _had _showed him a way to see all the pictures he didn't have the money to before the war from the comfort of his own sofa. He knew he would have to brave the modern movie house at some point, but he was too scared to do it alone yet. Chancing a glance in her direction, he caught her typing on the little black rectangle that everyone seemed to have nowadays, shifting his head to look back out the window before she noticed him.

The corner of his mouth turned down in contemplation as his thoughts turned to her. What was her angle? Here was this dame, Holiday Morgan, who happened to look a little like Ava Gardner if you turned your head just right. Her clothes looked like slight variations on women's styles he was already familiar with…only with some insane need to be six inches taller. When she spoke, it was nothing short of the "grace under pressure" tone that Peggy always used. Miss Morgan, as he'd observed from her interactions with Director Fury and her cool demeanor while walking him through her set of directions, was almost everything he had always been told a proper lady should be years ago…only completely comfortable in this new time. He was startled out of his thoughts by a loud series of computerized beeps from the back of the room.

Holly tugged on the bottom of her grey wool sweater dress to un-bunch it from the red patent leather belt circling her waist before tossing on her red pea coat. "I just got the rest of the day off," she announced with a cheery smile, searching for his gaze as she picked up her leather tote. "So how 'bout it, Captain? I'll even buy you a cup of coffee." Stepping around him, she began to walk backwards towards the elevators.

Steve looked from the bag of records already under his arm, to her red pumps, then to her face. A proper lady just offered to buy him a cup of coffee.

She pushed the button to call an elevator to take her down to the lobby. "Going down, Captain." As she stepped into the elevator, she poked her head out quickly. "I promise I don't bite!" she called in a sing-song voice, smirking when he dashed into the elevator car with her.

"S-So, what kind of music do you listen to that you still buy records? I didn't think they made them anymore," he said nervously, fingering the corner of the bag. He realized long ago that he may look like every woman's dream on the outside, but had no idea how to keep one talking long enough to get a date out of it. God, if only Bucky could see him now. He cocked his head to the side, realizing this must look extremely strange to Miss Morgan. Hell, if Bucky were here, he'd be confused by these pod things, too!

"Let's just say records have made a comeback in recent years among the…people of my generation," she explained patiently, carefully choosing her words to avoid having to come up with an explanation for "indie rock" on the spot. It'd be like explaining The Black Keys to her late grandfather. "But to answer your question, I listen to all sorts of things. One of the biggest things I think you've missed is the evolution of music. So many genres to choose from now. Maybe if I don't scare you away," Holly began as she exited the elevator in the lobby and dug around in her bag for her sunglasses. "I'll let you into my living room so you can see my collection for yourself."

Steve picked up his pace, making sure to beat her to the door. Holding the heavy glass door open for her, the late winter wind began rushing at him. Once she exited ahead of him, he plunged his hands into the warmth of his leather jacket pockets. The bag of records she'd given him was safely tucked up under his left arm. Without removing his hand from his pocket, he offered her his right arm without thinking. When she looked up at him in shock, he winced. Was chivalry dead? Had that gone, too?

Her initial shock quickly changed into a huge smile. "The last person who offered me their arm," she said, looping her left hand around his arm, "was my grandfather after my college graduation."

He stopped walking and looked down to see her neatly manicured fingers sliding down into the leather folds keeping the crook of his elbow warm. "Well, if you haven't noticed, I'm more than a little old-fashioned, ma'am."

"I'm going to tell you this once more, Captain, it's Holly." With a gentle tug on his arm, she began leading him off towards the record store. "And besides, I wasn't complaining about 'old-fashioned'. I rather like it. I wonder sometimes how we got away from it." She chuckled.

"And if I'm to call you Holly," he added quickly, "then I'm Steve."

"It's nice to meet you, Steve," she replied with a laugh. A gust of cold wind blew between two buildings, causing Holly to pull herself tighter to the soldier to try to stay warm. She motioned for him to turn off West 47th Street and up Broadway.

As they approached Colony Music Center, she motioned for Steve to hand over the bag of records. She couldn't help but smile when he held the door open for her again. "What's happening, Colony Charlie?" she called over the steady beat of mid-Nineties hip hop filling the store, moving her head in time to the beat when she realized what song was playing.

"Coco Chanel!" the burly redheaded man replied enthusiastically from behind the counter. "Getting off early again, I see." He peered around his regular customer and caught sight of her shopping companion.

Holly shrugged. "Boss is out of town." She gingerly placed the brown paper bag on the corner of the counter. "Hold that for me, will you?" When he gave her a thumbs-up and put the bag behind the counter, she looped her arm back through Steve's and began to lead him into the shelves of records.

"Coco Chanel?" Steve asked, raising an eyebrow. "Even I know who that is." His arm slowly dropped hers as his eyes widened. There had to be thousands of records here. He probably was familiar with about ten of them, but the choices were endless. There had to be something in here that would be right up his alley.

She stopped in front of the bin marked "new releases" and began to thumb through the titles as she hummed along to Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It". "I always pay in cash, and I won't tell him my name. Plus, the first time I came in here, I had my Chanel logo earrings in," she said with a shrug. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Steve running his callused fingers over the spines of various records in the "B" section. Still perusing, she began swaying her hips and softly singing along.

Finally pulling a selection off the shelf, Steve gazed at the mostly blue cover interspersed with black and white photos of four men he didn't recognize. He'd seen a girl of no more than sixteen wearing a shirt advertising what he assumed to be the name of the band the previous day. He knew that he could have easily looked the band up on the shiny computer that Miss M – Holly (they _were _outside of S.H.I.E.L.D.) had left in his apartment for him, but he never got around to it. Feeling a gentle pressure on his forearm, he turned and saw Holly smiling at him.

"The Beatles? Wow. You're skipping a little bit of music history there." She pointed at the title of the album he'd found, _A Hard Day's Night_. "Great album, don't get me wrong. I own a copy, so you can borrow it before you buy."

An hour later, Steve had managed to not only find a handful of records to add to his collection and remember his pin number when it came time to purchase them. The Johnny Cash records Holly knew he would like. Adele? The more she thought about music he would be familiar with from before he went down, the more she realized that at least as far as music was concerned, he would be alright.

Pulling her vibrant coat tighter around her as they exited the store, she grinned. "I believe I promised you a cup of coffee, soldier."

He quickly shoved both bags of records beneath his left arm and extended his right toward her. "I believe you did."

"I promise nothing bad will happen if I walk without holding onto you. The last thing you want is to drop those records all over the sidewalk." Holly eyed him readjusting the teetering bags carefully.

Once the bags were situated, he raised an eyebrow and tried not to smile. "I've balanced three dames on a motorcycle. I can handle two bags of records."

"Well if you insist…"

"I do." He found himself unable to hold back a smile any longer when she finally looped her arm back through his mid-stride. "So where are we headed?"

"Make for Grand Central." She chanced a sideways glance at him, she felt her heart warm a little when his face lit up. "It's still in the same place."

"I went for a walk before you took me to my apartment when I couldn't sleep. I saw it."

"Well then I guess you don't need me," she said with a tone of mock offense, snatching her arm away.

"P-Please, that's not what I meant!" Steve exclaimed as he reached out to grab her hand. A confused look crossed his face when Holly burst into laughter.

"Steve, I was kidding." She returned to his side, giving his arm a reassuring squeeze. "I mean, I know there was a war going on, but people still made jokes, right?" The look on his face told her that he didn't exactly appreciate her sense of humor at the moment. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"Of course there were still jokes," he began with a heavy sigh. "I just haven't had a lot to joke about, let alone be happy about lately." Looking up at the blue sky dotted with clouds, he shook his head. "Of course, I say 'lately' and the last joke I remember making was in 1944."

She tilted her head to lay it on his shoulder. "I wish I could make you all kinds of promises that it'll all be okay, but I can't. I can tell you that eventually you'll hit a point where it doesn't hurt quite as badly, but that's about it. A piece of advice? Mindless comedy films where you don't really have to pay attention much and ice cream help a little."

"I'll have to remember that," he said as a hint of a smile began to form. He wasn't going to ask what happened to her, but it felt nice to have someone who understood.

"That's what friends are for." She pointed at a small café across the street from Grand Central Terminal. "Advice and coffee."

"F-Friends?"

"I just showed you the secret to my record collection, and you just admitted that I need to give you a list of my 'instantly feel better' movies and get you some Ben & Jerry's." She motioned for him to wait as she waved at a blonde waitress walking back toward the café door from the seats outside. "Beth! Where do you want us?" When the waitress pointed inside, Holly nodded and led Steve inside.

"Hey Holly!" Beth greeted with a smile as her regular guest and a friend made themselves at home at the counter, grabbing two coffee cups and the coffee carafe. Her eyes widened at the realization of who the second person at the counter was. "Wireless Radio?" she asked in disbelief. What she didn't see was Holly trying desperately to contain laughter…

* * *

The next night, Steve raised his hand to knock on Holly's door, but quickly withdrew it. As he opened and closed his right hand several times, he sighed heavily. This was definitely a new experience. Enough dames had turned him down before Project Rebirth that he had the whole spiel memorized by now. He was a nice guy, but they couldn't be a couple for one or more of a whole litany of reasons. He could just change the personal pronouns and let her down gently. Would she ever talk to him again after this? He did enjoy having someone to talk to, someone who quietly slipped him what he liked to call "new world advice"…

The door suddenly swung open, revealing Holly as she tried to stifle a grin. "Were you ever going to knock?"

He cleared his throat and smiled sheepishly. "Eventually." When she shook her head and stepped aside, he finally stepped into the garden apartment. His blue eyes widened as he took in the living room and open kitchen before him. His initial shock was at the thought that just this portion of the apartment was bigger than the _entire_ apartment he shared with his mother as a child. The shock continued as he caught sight of the dark lacquered wood of her sofa. Art Deco! Something he recognized.

"Found that while I was finding furniture for your apartment, actually," she called from the kitchen as she stirred the mashed potatoes. "I thought 'What the hell, I could use a new sofa', so I picked that up for me."

"It's beautiful." Crouching down to look in the bookshelf ends of the piece, Steve quickly realized that while the sofa was almost as old as he was, the books were not. Introduction to Polymer Physics? Introduction to Polymer Chemistry? Fundamentals of Materials Science and Engineering: An Integrated Approach? Diffusion and Diffusion-Controlled Reactions? What in the world was a "polymer"? He'd need a dictionary to talk to her.

Something was definitely on his mind. Not that he'd exactly said a ton during their previous encounters, but he was acting about as nervous as a high-strung cat in a new house. Should she have not opened the door and let him knock on his own time? She shook her head and made her way over to the small, glass-topped oak kitchen table, balancing a hefty bowl of mashed potatoes in one hand and a bottle of wine and two glasses in the other. Once the bowl had been placed next to the pork chops, she motioned for him to come sit down.

She sat down across the table from him, trying desperately to get some kind of idea of what was bugging him. The desire to understand suddenly dissipated when he suddenly began maintaining radio silence after the first bite of food. Maybe the food would loosen his lips.

Once his plate had been thoroughly cleaned, Steve sat his silverware down and folded his hands in his lap. It was now or never. "Holly, I'm sorry."

She raised an eyebrow, looking skeptically across the table at her guest. "Sorry for what?"

"I'm not ready to uh…be with anyone yet."

"What does that have to do with the price of eggs?" Holly questioned, now more confused than ever. She began to do a quick mental check of all her actions since she'd donned the uniform and told him he was in a recovery room in New York City. What brought this on?

"Y-You cooked all of this," he said, motioning at the generous spread of pork chops, mashed potatoes, green beans, and rolls. "…and invited me over. It's just the two of us…"

Holly quickly clapped a hand over her mouth and nose when an unwelcome burning sensation began rising in her nasal passages. She'd never shot wine out of her nose before, but there was always a first time for everything. "You thought…" She paused and motioned between them. When he nodded in an attempt to hide the rising blush, she sucked her bottom lip between her teeth. "Oh my god. Steve, I'm so sorry."

Now, it was Steve's turn to be utterly confused. "So you're not…"

"No," she blurted almost too quickly. "I'm sure you'd be a great catch for _somebody_, but I can tell you right now that somebody isn't me. Did they have the cliché about 'it's not you, it's me'…before?"

"There was an equivalent," he admitted sadly. It'd been used on him many times. What was one more time?

Holly took a long sip from her wine glass. "I can't lie and say that part of it is the fact that you were in Europe in the Second World War with my late _grandfather_. I've dated men who were older than me before, but not quite that much older." When he cracked a small smile, she leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs at the ankles. "The rest of it, though... You don't want to hear it."

"Yes I do."

She began to absentmindedly twirl a dark ringlet around her left index finger, letting out a soft sigh. The answer he wanted, and probably deserved, was going to involve divulging things she'd only recently begun to admit to herself. "Before I moved to New York, I was involved with someone for two years." A sudden smile crossed her face as the memory of perhaps the most unforgettable first date ever came rushing back. "I was happier than I'd ever been. We were inseparable."

"So what happened?" He'd known this curious girl for not quite two weeks, and this was the first time she'd ever mentioned any personal details about her life before she moved to the Big Apple apart from how she knew the Starks. Something had to have gone horrifically wrong for her there. As soon as the question had left his lips, her smile faded away, leaving only a pair of dark eyes threatening to well up with tears.

"He uh…went away for a while," Holly confessed as her voice began to crack, leaving the exact details up to Steve's imagination. "When he got back to California, he had changed. The man that I loved was still there, but he'd taken the world onto his shoulders. He tried to make something to help with the horrors, but once they were over, he chose his creation over me. I left." She couldn't help but feel slightly amused that Steve was paying that close of attention to her story…or that he even cared at all. "Even though I'm the one who chose to leave, he left a pretty big hole to fill. I've dated other people since, but I find myself comparing every single one of them to _him_."

"Sadly, that's something I can relate to," he said with a sad smile as he moved some food around on his plate.

"Peggy?"

He nodded, idly running his finger up and down the handle of his fork. "So why did you invite me here?"

"Because you looked like you could use a friend about as much as I do."

"You've been here four years. You can't tell me that you don't…"

"I don't have many in New York. I got a reputation in California, and it followed me here." When Steve began to look concerned, she waved him off. "It's nothing bad. I'm not a wanted fugitive or anything. It seems like everyone knows about it. Even Agent Coulson, someone I consider a friend, knows about it. He's never brought it up, but he still knows. Hell, I'm sure even you'll find out about it one day, but until then, why spoil a good thing?" She raised her wine glass hopefully. "To friends?"

"To friends."

* * *

_March 15, 2006_

_5:00 pm_

_Malibu, California_

Tony Stark chuckled softly as he looked out the window to see a familiar BMW pulling up in front of his house. Three weeks had passed since he met Holly Morgan in her UCLA lab on her birthday. They'd seen each other the following weekend…and the one after that. Last week, he called the younger blonde saying that he needed her help…with some "tension" that needed to be worked out. Naturally she came right over. He couldn't lie, the weekends filled with various shades of debauchery (who knew the grand piano would be a very nice place for sex?) and surprisingly some science had done wonders for his over-inflated ego. What man _wouldn't _want a pretty, smart blonde at his beck and call?

This weekend, however, he wanted to see if she would come of her own accord. They'd exchanged some flirtatious texts over the course of the week, but it had taken her more time than usual as the week went on to respond. Two hours ago, his question was answered. Holly texted him simply "I just finished a week from hell. I need to get away from everyone. Are you free?" About fifteen seconds after he replied that he was indeed free, he received a second message from her saying that she would be at his door as fast as she could physically make it there.

When he opened the door, he didn't see the bright and bubbly girl that had come the past two weekends. This girl struggled to pull her oversized tote bag across the console, slammed her car door, and walked slowly toward him with a tired smile. "Morgan, you look like you're about to fall down."

"Week from hell, remember?" she reminded gently through a yawn. "I've slept about four hours in two days."

As she walked past him and into the house, he pulled her bag from off her shoulder and began to carry the pink paisley print monstrosity the rest of the way, wondering why in the world she decided to come all the way out to Malibu when she clearly needed to pass out somewhere comfortable, like in her own bed.

Holly quickly pulled her Blackberry from the back pocket of her dark jeans, removed the battery cover, and yanked out the battery before tossing all three pieces into the pile of papers poking out of her bag. "We're the only two people who know where I am right now. My phone is off. I don't want to talk to anyone else."

He dropped the bag to the floor, failing to suppress a wide grin when a pile of papers containing various kinds of notes and charts. "Nice filing system."

"And before you dropped it, I knew where everything was! Don't make fun of my filing system."

Before she could stop him, Tony picked the bag back up and began to drag her downstairs to his garage-slash-work area. "I am going to put this bag down here where you can't think about it. Then, we're going to go out and get you liquored up so you'll relax."

Holly tried to wriggle out of his grasp as he quickly punched in a code for the heavy glass door in front of them, groaning when she failed. "Tony, we don't need to go anywhere. We can't."

Dropping the bag onto his work table, he spun around to face her and folded his arms across his chest. "And just why in the hell not?"

She flopped down into one of the swivel chairs nearby and covered her face with her hands. "Because you get your picture taken wherever you go, and that's the last thing I need right now. I can't have any of my professors, especially the ones I'm defending to, think that you did one ounce of this work for me." She let out an exasperated sigh when he began to laugh. "And just what is so funny?"

"You're about to finish a masters degree at twenty-one. You're capable of much more than this, trust me," he said, pointing over at her bag. "You don't need me to do any work for you."

"Please Tony, not now. You can parade me up and down Rodeo Drive in a bikini for all I care…after I've got that piece of paper in my hand come June." When Tony gave her a knowing grin that was silently asking if she was serious, she glared at him. "You know what I mean." The man really was incorrigible.

Sitting down in the other swivel chair, Tony pulled out a handful of papers from her bag. As he quickly scanned her notes on the polymer she created in the lab (and JARVIS fabricated enough of it for her to have a good sized sample to make into a long sleeved shirt), he couldn't help but be impressed. In three weeks, she'd done every possible test to the polymer she'd since named "Ghost". She tested the tensile strength of the individual fibers. She'd even taken a second swatch of material to a shooting range and calculated impact resistance. Her notes were so detailed, she might want to keep an eye on her bag just in case that annoying prick Hammer decided to get too close to her. "You know, it is downright sexy how smart you are. We should totally get you some black plastic-framed glasses and do a sexy-librarian thing…" He stopped abruptly when she reached up and snatched her notes away, shoving them back in her bag.

"I told you I had the week from hell. I'm so nervous about defending this that I spend every day trying not to throw up. I came to spend some time with you because not only have you proven that it is possible to fuck the tension right out of someone, but I happen to enjoy talking to someone who doesn't talk down to me that can understand what these notes mean. I'm not really in the mood for sexy-librarian right now." She closed her brown eyes and began massaging her temples in an attempt to diffuse the headache that she fought the entire car ride to Malibu.

Using his heels as both the gas pedal and the brake, he rolled his chair behind hers. He wrapped his arms around her stomach and placed his chin on her shoulder, letting his head loll over and rest against hers. "When do you defend?"

"April twenty-seventh," she answered in a wavering voice, moving her hands to hold his in an effort to seek comfort.

"Plenty of time to get your presentation down. If you need somebody to run it by, don't hesitate to call, okay?" When he felt her head nod against his, he closed his eyes and held her a little tighter. "You're going to be fine," he whispered in an un-Tony-like voice of reassurance.

"So between you and my grandfather, I've got two people in my corner," she scoffed, letting out a nervous laugh.

"What about _Barbara_?" he asked, placing sarcastic emphasis on Holly's grandmother's name.

"You're joking, right? The woman who said that everything I've done since I was sixteen was to spite her and that being a housewife like _her_ daughters was what was best for me?" She shook her head. "I just really want to prove to her especially that I can do something that none of the rest of the old boy's club can do."

"I've got faith in you." Tilting his head upwards, he placed a gentle kiss on the corner of her jaw. He smiled when she shuddered as his facial hair tickled the side of her neck. "I may know a little something about trying to live up to and impress your family. So if you ever need to vent…"

She quickly rotated the chair so she faced him, relief written all over her face that _someone_ finally understood. She threw her arms around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder. Just as she began to lift her head to offer her thanks, she felt a now familiar pair of arms fold back around her middle to pull her squarely into Tony's lap. When she looked into his eyes, a look of mutual understanding passed between them. Holly began inching her lips closer and closer to his.

Tony let one hand rest on the small of her back and let the other wander upwards, tangling in her long blonde hair. After what felt like an eternity, he craned his neck upwards and captured her lips with his. All the previous kisses they shared had been frenzied, frantic, and desperate for more. This one… This one was definitely different, he decided when she sighed softly into the kiss. A sigh. Not a moan, but a soft and contented sigh. Could it be that Tony Stark inspired something else in this petite woman other than pure unadulterated lust? When he noticed that she hadn't made a move to take any of his clothes off (and he hadn't made one to remove any of hers), he suddenly felt like a horny teenager in a make-out session. Of course, he spent a portion of his horny teenage years at MIT…

A good portion of the women who had come and gone over the years looked at his possessions, the cars mostly, and got this look in their eyes that he would buy them something just as expensive…simply because he could. Sure, Holly had stared at the cars (especially the brand new Tesla Roadster and the classic Cobra), but the look in her eyes was completely different. If she had batted her eyes at her grandfather just right, he probably would have bought her almost any one of the cars she could ask for. The only questions she asked about them were about what, if any, modifications he'd made or the efficacy of the newest type of ceramic disc brake in the Audi. Sure, she may be a chemical genius like her old man and his old man before him, but the fact that she could intelligently talk to him about the new lithium-ion battery in the aforementioned Roadster intelligently and smoothly… He'd be lying if he said he wasn't mildly aroused.

Holly broke the kiss slowly. She closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his, letting out a slow breath.

When she whispered "thank you" so softly it was barely audible to the billionaire, he just smiled and breathed deeply, savoring the moment. Just this once, words weren't necessary. This was definitely the start of something awesome.


	5. Chapter Four

Chapter Four

_So you will please say hello_

_To the folks that I know_

_Tell them I won't be long_

_They'll be happy to know that as you saw me go_

_I was singing this song._ _  
We'll meet again._

_Don't know where, don't know when. _

_But I know well meet again, some sunny day…_

Shutting the plastic door of the overhead storage compartment once his suitcase was firmly in place, Steve sat down in the empty leather seat in first class by the window. He was silently thankful to Holly that she made sure he had the window seat so he could look out…and see that he was taking off and landing normally, not crashing.

Holly sat down in the seat in the row next to Steve. She quickly shoved her oversized purse under the seat in front of her and flipped the switch to put her iPhone into "airplane mode". Adjusting herself in the blue and white seat, she buckled her seat belt and leaned her head back on the headrest.

She chanced a quick glance at her traveling companion and smiled sadly. Steve had clearly tried to follow her lead and buckle the seat belt, but was having a difficult time. Without saying a word, she reached over the armrest and fastened the buckle for him. The gesture earned her a flustered offer of thanks after her knuckles accidentally brushed over the black metal of his belt buckle.

As the young blonde flight attendant began demonstration of the oxygen mask, Holly watched out of the corner of her eye as her friend began picking nervously at his already short fingernails. When a thought hit her like a sack of bricks just as the plane began to taxi down the runway, she reached over and snatched Steve's right hand away from his left to stop him from drawing blood. The last time he was consciously on an airplane…things didn't quite go his way. She probably should have given him some kind of pep talk, explained the physics of flight and exactly how safe air travel had become since he last flew. Maybe "safe" wasn't the word to use. Eddie Rickenbacker was reluctant to ever use the word "safe" when it came to air travel…and he wasn't just the owner Eastern Airlines, he was America's most successful fighter ace in the First World War. "You'll be fine."

He closed his eyes as the force of the plane beginning to take off pushed his head back into the headrest. "It's not the takeoff that worries me."

Holly stretched awkwardly across the armrest and dropped her chin onto his right shoulder as the plane continued to climb upwards through the low-hanging clouds. "I'll be right here the whole time, okay?" At his nod, she gave his hand a reassuring squeeze. "If you need _anything_, even if I fall asleep, just ask."

Steve cocked an eyebrow at the petite brunette. "You can sleep during this?"

"I uh… I used to fly a lot before I got on with S.H.I.E.L.D., actually. You get used to it." She released his hand and reached down into her purse, pulling out a black sleeping mask and ear plugs. "These help, too," she said with a smile.

* * *

Steve sighed heavily. The blue and white leather seat he'd occupied for the past seven hours since the plane took off from Newark was certainly more comfortable than the crude bench he'd sat on in Howard's plane, but he was about to go stir-crazy. He set down the hard-cover book he'd purchased to keep himself occupied on the tray table, Vietnam at War: The History 1946-1975 after sliding his boarding pass between the pages to mark his place. He'd made it through about three hundred out of the almost nine hundred pages of the tome so far.

Peeking over at Holly out of the corner of his eye, he couldn't help but smile. The normally calm and collected woman he'd come to know was still fast asleep with her seat reclined. The silk sleep mask covered her brown eyes, and the yellow foam ear plugs were still firmly stuck in her ears. Her head suddenly rolled over to the right, causing her mouth to droop open and a soft snore to escape. She'd fallen asleep after quickly downing two cocktails and dinner, managing to stay asleep for four hours despite the turbulence they'd flown through two hours earlier.

Admittedly, he did try to sleep like she recommended, especially since she'd chosen an overnight flight. Their plane would land at just after ten in the morning London time, meaning his body would be on New York time and think it was just after five in the morning. His nerves refused to let him fall asleep, a combination of being scared of the plane crashing and nervous about seeing Peggy again.

"This is your captain speaking," the male voice thick with a Southern drawl began, causing Holly to wake up with a start and Steve to snigger at her. "We are now beginning our final approach to London Heathrow. Please raise your tray tables and your seats to their full, upright position. Flight attendants, please prepare for descent."

Without removing the mask or the ear plugs, Holly's thin index finger found the button to adjust the seat back to normal. When it clicked back into place, she removed her sleep aids and shoved them back into her purse. She bit her lip when she saw Steve trying to lock the tray table back with a very shaky hand. She reached across his seat and closed the latch with one finger before sandwiching his right hand between both of hers. "Just keep swallowing to clear your ears like before," she whispered. "I promise the train ride to Winchester won't be so scary." When he smiled softly at her words of comfort, she knew he was going to be alright.

* * *

Holly stood behind Hugh Chapman as he knocked on the white wooden frame of the door leading into Peggy Clark's breakfast nook. She couldn't help but internally critique his choice of clothing for the day. Jeff Daniels circa _Dumb and Dumber_ called and asked for his wardrobe back. She'd already bitten back the urge to vomit when the man answered the door with a lecherous smile. Hopefully, Harry Dunne here could keep a secret.

Steve was holding back behind her, his hand gripping his friend's tightly. This was his date…seventy years too late. Could he actually go through with this?

"Gram," Hugh began slowly, entering the room with his hand still gripping the door frame. "You've got a visitor."

The now-white haired woman set down her brown ceramic coffee cup on the oak tea table as a confused look crossed her face. "I-I wasn't expecting anyone. Who is it?"

Around the corner, Holly gave Steve's hand a gentle squeeze and a reassuring smile before stepping in front of Hugh. "It's Holiday Morgan, Mrs. Clark," she said softly, clutching an oversized green canvas bag to her chest.

Peggy smiled at her old friend's granddaughter. "How many times have I asked you to call me Peggy, Holiday?"

"Almost as many times as I've insisted that I prefer to go by Holly." She began to nervously finger the strap of the bag.

She slowly pulled herself into a standing position. "Now what in heaven's name would get you out of your laboratory and onto a plane to me?"

"It seems that my employer has come across some items that might hold some…sentimental value for you." Holly began to cautiously walk over towards the small table.

"And could you not have just shipped them to me?"

She sighed heavily and reached into the bag, almost flinching when her fingers grazed the combination of cool metal and seventy year old leather inside. "Some things are best delivered in person," she whispered, handing the helmet to Peggy.

Reaching toward Steve's old helmet, the older woman's hand began to shake. If they'd found the helmet, they'd undoubtedly found more. "T-There was a compass. Did they find it? Or his shield?" she questioned, running her finger over the capital A above the holes cut out for Steve's impossibly blue eyes as a lone tear began to run down her wrinkled cheek.

"The shield is in New York. I'm afraid they wouldn't let me give that to you," Holly lied. "As for the compass, if they've found it, they haven't told me. The wreckage was fairly spread out…"

On the other side of the wall, Steve found himself using every ounce of his self control not to defy his friend and run into the other room and show Peggy he was alive. He could practically hear her tears, which didn't make fighting off his own any easier.

"Do you have anything else in that bag for me?" She looked up at the younger woman who'd successfully proven her theory that any time Michael Morgan's granddaughter came into her life, someone else had died. When Holly shook her head, Peggy nodded. "Then I'll offer my thanks to you for travelling all this way to give this to me and ask to be alone for a while."

As the older woman turned to hide the downpour of tears, Holly closed the distance between them and put a hand on her shoulder. "I don't have anything else in the bag, Peggy, but I have one more thing for you that wouldn't fit in it." She took Peggy's hand in hers, gently pulling her toward the door frame.

"Holiday, I would really prefer to be alone. I don't need any more surprises today."

With her back against the thick door molding, she reached around and quickly grabbed Steve's hand, now clammy with anticipation. "This is a surprise you'll want to get. Trust me," Holly said, jerking Steve's hand, causing him to stumble into the room before bringing his hand into contact with Peggy's.

The old helmet dropped to the floor with a loud clang when Peggy looked up into the eyes of the man who'd almost fallen on top of her. "No," she said, withdrawing her hand. This man looked exactly like her Steve, but completely unchanged from the last time she saw him…seconds before he jumped onto Johann Schmidt's plane. "It can't be."

"It can be, and it is." Holly smiled.

A warm tear began its journey down Steve's face. He'd finally done it. He'd finally made it back to her. Her soft brown hair had turned white with age. The soft lines that were around her face seventy years earlier had grown into wrinkles. This is what he should look like today. He smiled and chuckled nervously. "Sorry I'm late."

* * *

"So my grandson tells me that Holiday Morgan arranged all this," Peggy said with a faint smile before she set down her tea cup and took a bite of her sandwich. Hugh and Holly had left an hour earlier, leaving her alone with Steve for some much needed catching up. She'd already showed him her first post-war photo album. The grandkids, she reasoned, could wait until after lunch. Airplane food hadn't improved over the years, and knowing Steve and his metabolism…he could stand to eat again. When Steve nodded from across the table, mouth full of food, she turned her head and took in a brief glance of her back garden through the open kitchen window. "I shall have to thank her properly."

Steve quickly swallowed the enormous bite of food and wiped his mouth. "I've got her phone number if you want me to…"

"No need," she said politely, cutting him off. "If I don't get to thank her before you leave, I owe her grandmother a call anyway. I can get her phone number from Barbara."

He almost dropped his fork. How small exactly was the world? He suddenly felt as if he was with Holly playing that "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game that he still didn't fully understand (mostly due to the fact that he didn't know who Kevin Bacon was), only the game was now "Six Degrees of Holly Morgan". "How…"

"There may be almost seven billion people on the planet, but it's a small world, Steve. I met Holiday's grandparents at a conference in Paris in 1949," she laughed softly, answering his question before he could finish it. "Her grandfather ran into Howard and started talking about heaven knows what. Barbara and I scurried off to the hotel bar. She and I still talk from time to time, although I haven't seen her since Michael's funeral." Pausing, she set down her fork and stared down at her plate. "Although it seems like every time we talk, someone else has died. It's the curse of getting old. The only times I've ever seen Holiday were at funerals, first at Howard and Maria's when she was barely six years old, then at Holiday's parents' a year later, then four years ago at Michael's."

"Holly said she met Howard's son the last time she saw Howard before he died." The super-soldier cringed at the memory of the Stark offspring's sharp tongue. "I met him briefly at S.H.I.E.L.D. not too long ago, and I have no idea how she could stand to be in the same room with him, let alone be friends. He…he talked down to her like she was nothing."

Peggy quickly stifled a laugh, almost choking on her tea. Composing herself by clearing her throat, she set the cup down again. "I'm sure you're familiar with the saying about there being a fine line between love and hate."

"W-What?" Sudden memories of Howard Stark and the "fondue" incident sprang to mind.

"Judging by the fact that your jaw is about to land in your lunch, I'd hazard a guess that she neglected to tell you about _that_ part when she regaled you with the tale of her life." Peggy watched in amusement at the sight of Steve's wheels turning as he tried to process her insinuation.

Steve had always heard that opposites attract. His mother had often told him that, mostly to cheer him up, but he was most definitely speechless at the moment. What in the world could have attracted his friend to the flashy billionaire who was fifteen years her senior? "She didn't mention hating him. What happened?"

She shifted her gaze from her long-lost Captain to her china plate. "That isn't my story to tell, Steve."

Looking down at his mostly empty plate, he clenched his jaw before looking back up at Peggy with a touch of anger in his eyes. He'd heard about the younger Stark's propensity for alcohol-fueled parties and manic behavior from various sources at S.H.I.E.L.D. and the newspapers. "Did he hurt her?" he asked slowly, solemnly. He would put aside his friendship with the man's late father and beat the living daylights out of him if he so much as laid a hand on his friend.

"Not to my knowledge," she replied, shaking her head. "Although, I'm fairly certain he was faithful for all of five minutes. All I know is that one day they were painting the town red. Barbara seemed to think a proposal was right around the corner. Tony had come to talk to Michael. Of course, Michael had said that it was strictly business, but…" The part of her that still subscribed to the notion that it wasn't her place to talk out of turn didn't want to say anything more because she only knew the information secondhand. The other part of her saw that look in his eye that told her everything – he knew he couldn't ask Holly about this, at least not yet.

"But?" he prodded gently.

"Then he got captured by terrorists and held in a cave for three months. When I saw Holiday at Michael's funeral…" The elder woman's face fell at the memory of seeing the previously bright, bubbly, and intelligent woman who consistently made the society pages with Tony Stark a shell of her former self. "S-She looked like she hadn't slept in months, and according to her grandmother, she hadn't. She left the funeral and sped to Malibu to see Tony. He'd just gotten back that morning. Then a month later, Tony declares himself Iron Man. A couple hours later there's a press release from Stark Industries saying that they 'grew apart and ended things mutually'. I was flabbergasted and called Barbara, who proceeded to tell me that her granddaughter was at that very moment up in her childhood bedroom crying her eyes out."

It was suddenly all Steve could do to keep from crying. He couldn't help but think that Peggy probably went through something similar when he disappeared.

"For three months she refused to believe anyone who told her Tony was dead." A faint twinkle appeared in her eye. "Sound familiar?"

He choked out a hoarse laugh, still trying not to cry in front of the woman he still carried a torch for. "Very."

* * *

Across town, Holly flopped down on a bench just outside Winchester Cathedral and sighed. She looked down at her phone and thought about calling Phil Coulson…just to "check in". After all, that _is_ who she told Hugh that was calling before bolting away from him with nothing more than a "Work calling, gotta go!". Phil hadn't called her. She just played her ringtone and pretended that it was a legitimate call.

The last time that Hugh Chapman tried to make a move on her, she shut him down quickly. Really, who tries to pick up a girl at a funeral? She just shook her hand, causing the diamond tennis bracelet that Tony had given her for her birthday that year to fall back into place around her wrist and asked him what rock he'd been living under. Because not only was he trying to pick up a girl at her own grandfather's funeral service, he was trying to pick up Tony Stark's girlfriend, who in case he didn't know, had just come back from the dead. This time she didn't have a Stark card to play. So she used the next best card – the office calling.

Hopefully Steve was having a better time. The thought brought a smile to her face. He was probably hip deep in photo albums. He'd been alone with Peggy for…almost two hours. It was possible they were already on the grandkids. As she aimlessly scrolled through her contacts looking for someone she might want to talk to, she couldn't help but feel a little sad for him. The pictures she'd be showing him showed her happy with someone else, moving on. She knew that part of him would be happy that Peggy had moved on. He wouldn't have wanted her to have wasted her life.

Unlocking the screen of her phone again, she dialed Phil's number. "So, has the world ended without me?"

* * *

**Author's**** Note:**Guys, I'm so sorry this took so long to update...and wasn't the ending of this chapter I promised. Life's been hectic (two jobs, hubby moving up in his company, dealing with my grandfather's death still). Plus, I've kind of got caught up in bits for later in this story. I may have massively rewritten...a lot. There are more Peggy feels to come in the next chapter (which WILL have the lead-in to Avengers). I didn't want to keep you waiting with nothing, so I split the chapter.

Song for this chapter is "We'll Meet Again" by Vera Lynn. I don't own anything except Holly, as always. Many thanks to **TrickPhotography **and **BreezeI****nMonochromeNight** for their assistance. And thank you all for your patience.

Can't wait to hear what you think!

Jen


	6. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

_All things must pass  
All things must pass away  
All things must pass  
None of life's strings can last  
So, I must be on my way  
And face another day  
Now the darkness only stays the night-time  
In the morning it will fade away  
Daylight is good at arriving at the right time  
It's not always going to be this grey…_

_One Week Earlier…_

Shifting the brown paper grocery bag onto his hip as the New York spring sun began to set behind him, Steve raised his hand to knock on Holly's front door. He let out a surprised gasp when the door flew open in front of him. "You always know I'm here before I knock."

"Because you're always _exactly_ on time," she chuckled, taking the bag from him. "Before I start cooking, I've got a surprise for you."

He shut the door cautiously behind him and raised an eyebrow. "I generally don't like surprises," he said warily before beginning to help unpack the cold beer and dinner ingredients she'd requested he pick up on the way over.

"I think you'll like this one." Smiling knowingly, Holly quickly crossed the open living room and kitchen and picked up a letter sized envelope. "Open it," she instructed, pressing it into his hands.

He opened the envelope slowly, his breath catching in his throat when he realized exactly what the contents of the envelope were – a set of round trip boarding passes from Newark to London. "W-What is this?"

"Boarding pass? It's just a fancy term for a plane tic-"

"I gathered that much," he interjected. "But why am I getting on a plane?"

She moved to stand beside her friend, removing another piece of paper from behind the first set of tickets and laying it on top of the other contents. "I believe there's someone waiting for you in Winchester, someone who's been waiting a very long time for a dance." When Holly saw him suck his lower lip between his teeth in thought, she placed a reassuring hand on his arm.

"She has," Steve muttered before a thought hit him. How in the world did Holly know what he'd promised Peggy over the radio seventy years earlier? "Wait, how do you know about the-"

Holly backed away slowly, folding her hands together. "If I tell you, you have to promise me that you won't repeat it to a soul, least of all her. I don't even know if she even remembers anything…"

"Who remembers what?"

"Promise me you won't say anything, and I'll tell you." At his nod, she motioned for him to sit down on the leather sofa before joining him. She dropped her hands into her lap and sighed. "I was at Howard and Maria's wake with my parents and grandparents. I was six. I had no idea what was happening."

As sad as it was to know a friend was dead, he couldn't help but think that there was quite an inordinate amount of alcohol at the gathering. "Knowing Howard, by the end of it no one really knew what was happening."

"I think that's an understatement. I sat next to Tony all during the funeral." Holly chuckled at the memory. "I think I fell asleep and drooled on his suit coat. My memory's a little fuzzy."

"You were six…"

"And I thought that Tony was drinking dark apple juice." She turned her head to look at Steve, failing miserably to suppress further laughter when she saw a smile break across his own face. "Eventually I lost track of everyone I knew. I saw a woman about my grandmother's age sitting alone with a glass of what I now know as gin, although I remember commenting that it smelled like she was drinking a Christmas tree."

At this point in the story, he wasn't really understanding why he couldn't repeat any of what he was being told, not that he had that many people to repeat it to who would understand what was going on.

"I asked her why she was all by herself, and I'll never forget what she said. 'I'm sitting alone because I _am_ alone'. She showed me an old black and white picture of a much younger version of herself, Howard, a man she identified as Colonel Phillips, and a mystery man. Said that she was now the only one left who remembered that a ninety pound asthmatic saved us all." Holly took his hand in hers.

"I… I heard my name being called across the restaurant, so I followed the voice. A tall lady in her late twenties probably handed me a hundred dollar bill, and said it was mine if I went and told Peggy that the mystery man in the picture was still alive. He just hadn't been found yet."

"What?" Steve asked in disbelief.

"It doesn't make sense, I know. Peggy asked me who told me to say that. I described the person, and she ran toward the door. She came back a few minutes later. No one was there by the time she got there. My mystery woman had gone. She said she owed the man in the picture a dance."

He shook his head, his face bearing the physical signs of his lack of understanding. "I don't understand. That was…"

"Twenty-one years ago, yes," she finished for him. Clearing her throat, she stood up and pulled him with her. "Let's go start dinner, shall we?"

"I-I told her then that I didn't know how to dance," he muttered as she thrust a bowl piled high with sliced vegetables she'd already peeled before his arrival. "I still don't."

"I don't know a lot, but I can teach you a little if you like while dinner cooks," Holly offered, not even looking up from the hunk of ground beef she was in the process of shredding into the pan to brown.

"Speaking of dinner, what exactly is this?"

She spun around with bits of raw beef stuck to her fingers, almost knocking off the pot of boiling potatoes off the stove. "You've got to be joking. The Irish kid doesn't recognize cottage pie when one's being prepped in front of him?"

A smile broke across his face at the mention of the dish. "Where did you learn to make it?" Steve asked, stepping closer to the stove.

"Let's just say the Morgan's haven't always been captains of industry. My great-grandfather was barely walking when he left Galway and landed on Ellis Island with his parents." Throwing the rest of the beef into the pan, she sidestepped Steve to wash the raw meat off her hands. "Everyone has humble beginnings."

He discovered early on in their friendship that he loved watching her cook. He noticed that she did a lot of things the way his mother had in the kitchen. Now it made sense. She was much farther removed from the Emerald Isle than he was, but that didn't mean she wasn't right. Steve let out a small laugh when she thrust a metal utensil into his open hand. Upon inspection, he recognized it as a slightly modernized potato masher.

"That pot of perfectly soft potatoes is calling your name, Steve. Get mashing," Holly barked with a smirk.

"Yes ma'am," he replied, touching the masher to his forehead with a mock salute. His friend was one blonde bob cut and a Belfast accent away from a young Sarah Rogers.

* * *

"Steve, what are you doing? We need to get to the airport," Holly reminded him with a gentle nudge. They were flying commercial. The flight wouldn't wait for them. She and Tony used to routinely miss their scheduled departure times, but since it was Tony's plane, it never mattered.

"There's one more thing that I have to do before I leave," he said with an air of finality and authority. "I don't know when I'll get the chance to come back." The super-soldier gripped the interior door handle of the black taxi tightly. With his jaw firmly set, he watched the city of London fly by the windows as the cab zipped almost effortlessly through the crowded streets. His heart sank when the car turned onto Swallow Street and stopped at the address he gave the driver. Throwing the door open, he let his arms fall to his side as he approached the chain link fence surrounding the old, burnt out building. Tears began to form in his eyes as he balled his hands into fists at the sight of an official looking order attached to the fence.

_BY ORDER OF THE MAYOR OF LONDON, THIS BUILDING IS TO BE DEMOLISHED ON 28 APRIL 2012 DUE TO EXTENSIVE DAMAGED SUSTAINED BY FIRE, RENDERING THE STRUCTURE UNSAFE. KEEP OUT._

This wasn't how any of this was supposed to turn out. He was supposed to have climbed out of the plane and returned to London a hero. He would have met Peggy here at this very spot. She would have taught him to dance. From there, he planned the rest of it all out as the plane began careening toward the ice below. He would have asked her to be his girl. After he'd personally, to borrow a phrase from Colonel Phillips, "escorted Adolf Hitler to the gates of hell", she would come back to New York with him. They'd get married, move out of the city, and start a family. They'd have three kids, a dog, and a white picket fence. They were supposed to grow old together. It was all supposed to start here - The Stork Club.

The moment she saw his hands form fists, Holly looked up, meeting the cabbie's light eyes in the rear view mirror. She silently asked him to hold the cab for a moment. Climbing out of the back seat, she walked slowly toward her friend and the shell of a building she didn't recognize. Without saying a word, she wrapped her arms around Steve's muscular right arm and rested her head on his shoulder. She closed her dark eyes when she felt his body shaking with silent sobs.

He wasn't supposed to be standing in front of the burnt remains of the place seventy years too late. Peggy certainly wasn't supposed to have spent years mourning his loss, only to marry someone else and have a family with him. He didn't even know who this Herman Clark was, but Steve knew he hated him. Peggy explained that Herman was a young doctor she'd met in the last days of the war. He'd gone on to be a family doctor in Winchester after the war, bringing two generations of children into the world and taking care of them into their old age…and his. She should have been Peggy Carter Rogers, not Peggy Carter Clark.

Suddenly jerking his arm out of Holly's comforting embrace, he silently walked forward, stopping only when he found himself toe to toe with the barrier. He took hold of the chain and padlock holding the gate closed and snapped the links like peanut brittle, ignoring Holly's frantic requests for him to stop. He could hear her chasing after him as he entered the remains of the social club, undoubtedly taking overly cautious steps in order to avoid damaging her expensive shoes.

He could hear her screaming at him to go back to the cab before he got them both arrested as he yanked a chunk of the charred remains of the brass foot rail off of the bottom of the bar top, holding the cylindrical section like a baseball bat. Squaring up like "Joltin' Joe" at the plate after stepping behind the bar, he brought the heavy piece of brass into contact with the old glass shelves that used to hold the liquor. The bar top behind him crumbled into dust and wood splinters as he swung around and began to repeatedly strike it with his makeshift Louisville Slugger.

How many times had his own mother told him that life wasn't fair as she held him and tried to slow his breathing as a child? He was absolutely sick of hearing it. How unfair was life allowed to get for him, for one person, before it turned around and started going his way? This was the place where the rest of his life should have begun! How long had she waited for him before giving up? How many subsequent nights had she come here, only to sit at the bar alone?

"Steve, stop it!" Holly shouted, watching in horror as the charred bar quickly turned into little more than mulch each time Steve connected the brass bar with the burnt wood. She had to stop him, but wasn't quite sure how to go about that. He had at least a foot on her in height and at least a hundred pounds, not to mention her footwear didn't exactly allow for the most stable steps. When his button-down shirt began turning a curious shade of "burnt-0ut bar brownish black", she knew she couldn't hold off her intervention any longer. Holly scurried across the remains of the once-beautiful hardwood floor, moving to grab the other end of the rail that Steve had turned into a weapon.

Instead of holding onto the large piece of brass as she intended, she found herself quickly flying across the room. She was right – she couldn't stop the super-soldier. He clearly hadn't even noticed her gripping the other end. With her back against the one part of the bar he hadn't smashed, she began to gasp for breath. The force of her hitting the bar back first had knocked the wind out of her. As she looked down to check for other injuries, she winced, not from pain, but from seeing navy sundress covered in years of dust and recent ashes. She soon heard the piece of metal hit the floor with a clang over the thumping of her heart in her ears. Steve's voice as he called out, dropping to the floor in front of her, was muffled.

He quickly threw her left arm over his shoulder and helped her up, apologizing profusely as she swatted at her dress in a vain attempt to remove the new stains.

"I'm buying you a punching bag for Christmas," she muttered as he helped her back into the cab.

Three hours and several hundred miles later, the 747 cruised normally thirty-five thousand feet above the North Atlantic. After the incident at what was the Stork Club once upon a time, both Steve and Holly managed to have a wardrobe change before boarding the flight. The pair hadn't said more than five words to each other after getting back into the cab on Swallow Street.

Steve, wrapped in a blue scratchy blanket provided by the flight attendant, stared intently out the window at the icebergs as they caught the fading sunlight. His forehead rested against the thick windows as his teeth chattered from the vibrations. _There shouldn't be that much ice in April_, he mused with a shiver. _And somewhere down there is a ship that's been down there for almost a hundred years exactly that thought the same thing._ How many of the icebergs below them had been there seventy years ago? They couldn't be more than fifty miles from where he'd downed Schmidt's plane…

Jerking his face away from the window, he found himself willing himself not to cry. It was bad enough that Holly had seen the worst of him earlier in the afternoon. The memory of the bruise in the middle of her back he'd seen as she removed her cardigan earlier continued to gnaw at him. It was almost all she could do to walk through the airport. She'd refused to take a wheelchair or any assistance from him. He'd hurt his friend with his outburst. He should never have agreed to come.

"But I ain't never seen a baby yell like Mae Mobley Leefolt. First day I walk in the door, there she be, red-hot and hollering with the colic, fighting that bottle like it's a rotten turnip."

Dropping her Kindle into her lap with little fanfare, Holly sighed. An hour. It'd taken her an hour to read a handful of sentences on the first page of Kathryn Stockett's The Help, an act that should have taken less than a minute. She'd been devouring book after book since she first learned how to read. She read Little Women by herself at age six for fuck's sake. Two days in London had clearly killed her massive attention span.

She leaned her head back against the seat, wincing as the tender spot on her back hit the cool leather. She happened to catch sight of Steve out of the corner of her eye, and she felt her heart sink. It was a horrible idea to have taken him to see this. She should have known that he'd insist on finding what remained of his world. She should have known that something bad would happen. Despite all of this being the shrink's suggestion, she couldn't help but think that she'd set his psychological recovery back by years.

When she felt a tear began to roll, she made a quick grab for her sleep mask. She turned her head toward the aisle once the mask was firmly in place and began to cry softly. The trip was a failure. Steve was unhappy. Suddenly, she felt a hand on her shoulder. Shit, she must not have hidden her tears well enough. Reaching up to her face, her hand brushed away a lone drop of water.

"What's wrong?" Steve whispered, gently pulling the mask away. "Are you in pain?" The question he wanted to ask, but didn't want to know the answer to came spilling out.

Holly shook her head, a strand of brown hair falling into her face. "I'm fine. Nothing's wrong."

"You're upset." When she turned back to face the window, he put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her over to him. "Please tell me what's wrong?"

She sighed, resting her cheek on the right side of his blanket-covered collarbone. "This was all such a bad idea. You smashed a building, and I've got a huge bruise on my back."

"I'm sorry I hurt you. I… You trusted me, and I should have paid more attention…" He cut himself off abruptly when she lifted the armrest and snuggled closer, the top of her head rested under his chin as her arms snaked around his torso. "What are you doing?"

"I'm getting comfortable and trying to keep you warm at the same time. You can hear your teeth chattering from a mile away."

He couldn't help but chuckle. "That was more from the vibrations on the window when my head was against it."

"Don't lie to me, Steve. You were looking out at the ice." Her warm hands found their way between the blanket and his shirt. "Some feelings you never forget, and I've got a feeling that extreme cold is yours."

"The trip wasn't a bad idea, Holly," he said, connecting his hands around her right arm to hold her in place before turning to look out the window once more. "I finally got my dance."

"Good. I'm not pretending to flirt with her grandson again to get you another one," she said as a gigantic yawn escaped her before her eyes began to drift closed.

He scrunched his face up in thought. What exactly had she done to the poor man? Just one look at him told Steve that Hugh Chapman was probably worse with women than he was.

"Holly?"

No response.

Steve smiled when he felt her hands drop from his side. She'd fallen asleep. "Goodnight, Holly," he whispered, leaning his head back on the headrest. Suddenly sleep sounded like a trend he could get behind.

* * *

From his hiding place in the doorway of the retro gym, Nick Fury sighed. He could hear the repeated, dull thuds of Captain Rogers's fists making swift contact with a punching bag. Word had reached him, even before his consultant and Rogers had taken off from Heathrow, about the incident at the hollow shell of the Stork Club. The super-soldier had some demons that would undoubtedly take time to work out, even with Doctor Shaw's therapy and an unlimited supply of punching bags. At least here, he wasn't destroying public property for demon-vetting.

The thuds stopped abruptly, only to be replaced with a bigger thud – from the bag bursting and hitting the wall. When he caught sight of Rogers hanging a second punching bag, he closed his eyes and began to walk forward slowly. One punch, then two. "Trouble sleeping?" he asked, clasping his hands behind his back.

"I slept for seventy years, sir. I think I've had my fill."

* * *

**Author's Note: **Look! I updated! *cheers as author raises glass of wine* FINALLY, as promised, the lead in to _Avengers. _I've got the events of the movie written out already. There are a few finishing touches that need to be added. I hope the next update won't take as long as previous ones, but I am going out of town for part of this weekend and a full weekend and part of one here in about two weeks (to deal with some things my late grandfather left me).

Good news is we will be getting into more juicy plot development after the events of Avengers. I'm rather excited about it. So excited that I might initiate another "review and get a snippet".

Part of this chapter was written with something else in mind. I follow "Avengers Head Canon" on Tumblr, and they had a post a couple weeks ago that made a light bulb go off in my head. Sadly, the light bulb has nothing to do with this story, but it does have everything to do with a side story I'm considering writing to accompany this story. I haven't written it yet, but I'm thinking about it. The little bit of this chapter that pertains to my side idea was tossed in so that if I write this other side piece...let's just say things will make sense. Nothing to worry about.

As always, I own nothing (except my little Holiday Morgan).

Can't wait to hear what you think!

Jen


	7. Chapter Six

**Chapter Six**

_I felt the crossfire stitching up soldiers  
Into a blanket of dead, and as the night grows colder  
In a window back home, a Blue Star is traded for Gold.  
Where to begin? Let's start with the end.  
This black and white photo don't capture the skin  
When metal is churned  
And bodies are burned  
Victory earned  
The War was in color…_

Having watched all but one segment of footage on his soon-to-be teammates, Steve rolled his eyes when he saw the last unopened file – Tony Stark. Would anyone ever know if he just decided to skip this part? He felt that he already knew everything he needed to know about Howard's son. The man was arrogant, rude…

Glancing back around the quinjet, he saw Agent Coulson sitting at the computer with the headset back on. He wouldn't know if Steve just skipped the footage, would he? He sighed heavily. With his luck, there'd be some kind of alarm in the tablet that would alert the agent to the fact that he skipped a segment. He groaned as the first video segment started up, revealing a younger looking Stark standing in front of a desert mountain range.

"_Is it better to be feared or respected? I say, is it too much to ask for both? With that in mind, I humbly present the crown jewel of the Stark Industries' 'Freedom' line. It's the first missile system to incorporate our proprietary repulsor technology._"

Squinting at a small block of text in the bottom left corner, the wheels in his head began to turn. He recognized the date, May 2008, from somewhere. He let out a barely audible gasp when his mind finally added two and two together. Tony had gone to do a weapons demonstration…and it took him three months to come home. This had to be the last footage taken of him before his disappearance.

"_They say that the best weapon is the one you never have to fire. I respectfully disagree. I prefer the weapon you only have to fire once._"

Steve paused the video, taking a moment to study the man before him. He couldn't help but smile. In that freeze-frame, he could almost see Howard. He'd never met Maria, the woman he learned from an old file that Howard married and had a child with, but at least on the outside, Tony was every bit of the man that his father was…attitude and all.

"_That's how Dad did it, that's how America does it, and it's worked out pretty well so far._"

The camera panned out to reveal about a dozen soldiers with guns and some kind of stand. Intrigued, Steve couldn't help but continue to watch, if only to find out what exactly that was.

"_Find an excuse to let one of these off the chain, and I personally guarantee the bad guys won't even wanna come out of their caves._"

His eyes widened when the camera zoomed in on various parts of the stand, revealing what appeared to be three streamlined bombs from his stint in combat. He let his jaw fall open at the sight of one of the three taking off on its own, splitting into pieces high in the air.

" _Ladies and gentlemen, for your consideration... the Jericho._"

As Stark the Younger was pushed forward by the aftershock of the explosion, Steve watched him pull a glass out of a cooler, the cold air meeting the desert air and turning into steam.

"_I'll be throwin' one of these in with every purchase of $500 million or more. To peace!_"

He rolled his eyes at the younger man's sarcastic toast. The man would have been out of a job if world peace were ever achieved. Well, before he stopped making weapons that would have been the case.

The second recording opened with Tony landing in the middle of a stage in full Iron Man armor. Machines began whirring around him to dismantle the intricate metal suit as scantily clad women in strips of fabric matching the suit danced to quite possibly the worst song to ever grace his ears in front of a giant screen that read "STARK EXPO".

Glancing over the corners of the video, Steve managed to again find a date stamped in the corner of the video. This one was taken just over a year after the last one, which meant that Tony and Holly were no longer together if Peggy's timeline held up.

"_Oh it's good to be back!_" Tony exclaimed through a satisfied smile. "_You missed me. I missed you too._" An inaudible voice shouted something to him off camera. "_Blow something up? I already did that._" Finally sporting a serious expression, he began his speech. "_I'm not saying that the world is enjoying its longest period of uninterrupted peace because of me. I'm not saying that from the ashes of captivity, never has a greater phoenix metaphor been personified in human history. I'm not saying that Uncle Sam can kick back on a lawn chair, sipping on an iced tea because I haven't come across anyone who's man enough to go toe-to-toe with me on my best day._"

Steve rolled his eyes. He began to quickly search his memories to try and see if he ever remembered Howard being quite this full of himself. He was struggling to find an incident, but he didn't entirely rule out the possibility. After all, he missed the rest of Howard's life after the war.

"_Please, it's not about me. It's not about you. It's not even about us. It's about legacy. It's about what we choose to leave behind for future generations. And that's why for the next year and for the first time since 1974, the best and brightest men and women of nations and corporations the world over will pool their resources, share their collective vision, to leave behind a brighter future. It's not about us. Therefore, what I'm saying, if I'm saying anything, is welcome back to the Stark Expo. And now, making a special guest appearance from the great beyond to tell you what it's all about, please welcome my father, Howard._"

He felt a wave of relief wash over him when the recording didn't stop, continuing on with an obviously older recording of Howard. A lump formed in Steve's throat as he gazed at the image of his friend taken almost thirty years exactly after he went down. Just like everyone else that he knew, Howard went on to have a life after the war.

"_Everything is achievable through technology. Better living, robust health, and for the first time in human history, the possibility of world peace. So from all of us here at Stark Industries, I would like to personally introduce you to the City of the Future._"

As he listened to the speech, he couldn't help but think back to the World Expo he'd attended with Bucky before the serum. They had a "City of the Future" then, too. He suddenly lost almost all interest in the speech, instead craning his neck to look out the cockpit window.

Would he and Howard still have been friends after the war if he hadn't gone down? Would he have watched Tony grow up? Would Tony have played with his and Peggy's children? If their children were older, would their daughter have babysat for little Tony? He could see it in his mind as clear as day – a teenage girl with his blonde hair and Peggy's features… He shut the daydream down just as it began to get painful and returned his attention to the tablet.

"_Technology holds infinite possibilities for mankind, and will one day rid society of all its ills. Soon, technology will affect the way you live your life every day. No more tedious work, leaving more time for leisure activities and enjoying the sweet life. The Stark Expo. Welcome._"

By the time the third and final recording was starting, Steve was rather weary of Tony Stark and his overinflated ego. He was tired of being reminded of the life he didn't get. He was ready to accept whatever reprimand would come his way if anyone found out he didn't review all of the files. Just as he reached a finger up to stop the footage, he froze at the sight of a familiar face – Holly. The combination of her blonde hair and the date on the video (July 2006) made him do some quick math in his head. Not only was she still with Tony, but their relationship was in its infancy.

"_Ghost Polymer shirt prototype three ballistic test take one_," she said as she stood in front of the video camera, making sure it was angled correctly.

"_Have I ever told you how sexy it is when you talk science?_" Tony now stood behind her with his arms wrapped around her waist and his lips attached to her neck.

"_Tony, quit!_" she squealed, failing miserably to hide her smile from the camera. "_As soon as we're done out here, you can take me back into Vegas and have your way with me_." She swatted his hand away when she felt fingers ghosting over her rear.

"_Mmm… Is that a promise_?"

"_Oh my god, we're going to have to edit this tape severely. I hope there are still results on this later_." Holly ripped herself out of his hold and scooped up a high-powered rifle, winking at Tony as she adjusted the scope.

"_And the only thing sexier than the science talk is you holding a gun. I can't decide whether to be extremely scared or extremely turned on_," the billionaire added with a knowing smirk as he pulled the slide back on his own AR-15. Positioning the butt of the rifle against his right shoulder as he lay on his stomach in the warm sand, he looked over at her and nudged her knee with his. "_God, I love you. Remind me how I got that lucky again?_"

"_You say that now, but then I'll beat you at blackjack tonight and be the spawn of Satan,_" she giggled.

"_That was one time and it was strip blackjack,_" he protested.

"_It's still not my fault that you couldn't keep your eyes off of me._"

"_I'll get you back for that later._"

"_Oh I'm counting on it._" She lowered her dark sunglasses and motioned for him to follow suit as she grinned from ear to ear. "_I love you, too._"

Looking down at the little indicator of time left in the video as it continued with the two lovebirds opening fire on a seemingly helpless shirt, Steve sighed heavily and looked away from the tablet. As much as he couldn't bring himself to believe that Holly and Tony had ever been in love, despite hearing it from Peggy herself, there was no way that he could deny it now. The evidence was literally right in front of his face. He quickly rewound the video, pausing it at her smile just before she returned his affection.

Something major had to have happened to turn them from two people obviously in love to her refusing to give him the time of day. Peggy had suspected infidelity. That'd do it, he reasoned. When he tried to reconcile that with the story she'd told him over dinner about the man who left a big hole to fill (he was ninety-nine percent certain that the man in question had to be Stark)… There was a piece missing there. There was something that he didn't know. He knew that it wasn't any of his business to find out, but the tactical side of his brain wouldn't stop whirring.

* * *

_April 27, 2006_

_Los Angeles, California_

_UCLA Campus_

Tony Stark suddenly found himself thankful for choosing tennis shoes earlier in the morning despite having a board meeting to go to. The aforementioned board meeting had run over…by an hour. It was probably still going on at the rate certain members blathered on, he mused as he walked as fast as he could while not spilling his newly acquired caramel macchiato with two extra shots of espresso from Starbucks all over himself. It wouldn't be the first time he ditched a board meeting for a woman, but it would be the first time he did it for _her_. He quickly clapped a hand over the lid of the drink, almost faltering on the home stretch by spilling it as he stopped abruptly in front of the room he'd been told to go to. He'd apologize to Holly for being late once she was done.

Pulling the door open gently, he silently hoped that the old blue door wouldn't squeak. He gently guided the door shut and slid into the first seat by the door in the back. After taking a sip of his coffee, he turned his attention to the front of the room. He already knew the content of her thesis presentation almost by heart. She'd gone over it _multiple_ times with him in the past week. The last time she ran through it with him was the previous evening. She shook like a leaf in the wind the entire time. He knew she hadn't slept because he hadn't either. He wondered how many cups of coffee she'd had already. He didn't want to even think about how many shots of espresso she'd put in them. However this Holly in front of him currently wasn't shaking. He could hear her loud and clear at the back of the room. Upon closer inspection, she'd also gone all out for her personal appearance. (Insomnia means one has plenty of time to do meticulous things with one's hair and makeup.) She'd also ironed pleats so sharp they should be considered dangerous weapons into her pants.

Tony grinned as he took another sip of the rapidly cooling beverage. The Holly in front of him should get the Oscar for Best Actress. He couldn't see a hint of nervousness in her eyes. This version of her could make the old guard on his executive board that constantly asked what his father would have done in every meeting stop and take notice. The smile never left his face as she continued with her presentation. When she began reviewing the experiments he'd watched her conduct in his lab, he kept his eyes on her instead of the screen containing the images from the tests.

She could be dangerous in the corporate world. She was smart and knew it. He never would have guessed that she hated meetings and presentations if she hadn't told him. Now all these professors had to do was rubber stamp everything and the two of them could start finding new ways to corner the market for…anything.

Bringing the coffee cup back up to his mouth, Tony stopped as a line from an old John Lennon song sprang to mind. "Life is just what happens to you when you're busy making other plans." He, Tony Stark, just made plans for something past the next day. He looked back down at the white plastic lid of the cup before again focusing on Holly. He never planned anything, not even work. He worked when the inspiration hit him, not because he had to. Now here he sat watching his girlfriend's presentation…

Wait, girlfriend? He'd never called that before, even in his own head. What exactly were they? He didn't "date" per say and she wouldn't let him take her anywhere yet, so they definitely weren't doing that. There hadn't been any declarations of well…anything. She'd just kept showing up at his house to work after that initial invitation to "work". Of course, by "work" he meant that she would inevitably be able to fight him off long enough to do just enough to say that she had before falling into bed with him.

She definitely wasn't a one night stand. They'd been at this two months. Besides, he actually had feelings for her. At the internal admission, part of his brain immediately started damage control. He couldn't remember a time where he'd put this much effort into relations with a woman that he didn't want something from. He'd jetted out of board meetings to go to "presentations" before, but this was the first time he hadn't lied. She'd asked him to come for moral support. Why him, though? She had a grandfather who would be more than happy to be here. There had to be another reason she wanted _him_ there. Maybe it had something to do with the conversation where he admitted to understanding needing to prove oneself to family.

…_Or she could have feelings for you_.

That just wasn't possible, he reasoned. He was Tony Stark. Women didn't have feelings for him. They had feelings for his money. However, when the woman in question had her own money…it got a little more complex. Holly couldn't be naïve enough to think that just because he kept letting her come back… No. She was smarter than that.

But more importantly, why was he resisting? Howard, if he were alive, would certainly tell him not to. He'd always wanted to have a Stark-Morgan conglomerate. Tony would be lying if he said that he couldn't see the benefits of an arrangement to be made there, but it had never been high on his priority list to pursue. His internal musings came to an abrupt halt when he saw Holly's facial expression twist into a frown.

"So what you're telling us is that you've basically just reinvented Kevlar's 'Protera' line," one of the professors interjected suddenly.

"No. 'Ghost' is what 'Protera' could be if DuPont had carried their creation through to its logical conclusion instead of stopping to rush product to the military infrastructure," Holly replied.

Tony crossed his legs at the knees. Judging by the look on her face, she was trying to contain herself. That was definitely one thing she was better at than he was. He'd given up on his filter long ago. But watching her struggle to maintain hers? Priceless.

"So you're saying that at twenty-one, you have done what established scientists at one of the largest chemical companies in the world couldn't do? You uncovered what they failed to see?"

When she simply answered "Yes", Tony almost gave himself away when he started to choke on his coffee. Her ability to hold her filter was slipping quickly.

She calmly batted her eyes and smiled with a mock sweetness. "Professors, I submitted this same material to the United States Patent and Trademark Office two months ago. They seem to think my creation is viable, as my patent is currently pending."

"Isn't a bit premature?"

"I don't think so, no. After all, what good is an invention without a practical use? My connection at Stark Industries has approached me about using it as an anti-ground fire cover for certain airborne missiles in their 'Freedom' line."

Almost spitting out the bit of coffee he'd consumed to keep himself from coughing, he couldn't help but notice that the banter had all but stopped.

One professor eyed the other two warily and cut the presentation off before possible fisticuffs broke out. "Thank you, Miss Morgan. A fine presentation." The older woman with salt and pepper hair winked at her knowingly before ushering the others out of the room.

Once the others were safely out of the room, Tony tossed his coffee cup and began walking down the auditorium steps. "Your 'connection at Stark', huh?"

Holly laughed softly as she began gathering up her computer and papers and shoving them into her bag. "It shut them up didn't it?"

"It did, but I've got a feeling that I'm about to have a pissed off R&D director." He slid an arm around her waist and pulled her against him.

Positioning her bag on her shoulder under her purse, she rolled her eyes. "I lied to some professors, Tony. Tell him it's a rumor."

"It's only a rumor until I tell him that we should look into it." He glanced up at the ceiling and blew a raspberry before planting a kiss on her forehead. "I'm only sorry that I didn't think of it first."

Holly's hand fell open, much like her jaw, and laptop keys sprayed across the room when the computer met the floor.

* * *

It felt like he'd only been awake from his ice-induced diversion for ten minutes and there were already little green men from Mars involved? Steve could definitely feel a headache coming on, a headache that Tony Stark certainly was _not_ helping with. He was always willing to accept that there were things that were simply beyond his comprehension. He was an art student from Brooklyn that was still unsure of exactly how a vacuum tube worked. He didn't much concern himself with science, instead leaving that to those smarter than he was – like Holly. But unlike the petite brunette, Tony Stark didn't stop when Steve's eyes began to glaze over and revert to simpler terms that the man from another time could identify with. Tony didn't use the place settings from an in-flight meal to explain what happens inside a supercollider. Tony Stark kept going _ad nauseum_ using words and phrases that seemingly only he and Doctor Banner could understand.

Then there were the wisecracks. Admittedly, he turned around at the mention of a game called "Galaga". He had no idea what it was and made a mental note to ask Holly about it later. Games were fun. Maybe it was something he'd enjoy, like Monopoly. At least that was still around. Maybe he could beat her at whatever "Galaga" was just like he beat her soundly at Monopoly. He could _feel_ Tony's eye roll when he caught a reference that he actually understood. He couldn't even have his brief moment of self-congratulation. When he looked back for validation, all he got was ignored. This was not going to be his day.

Strolling into the lab was all the confirmation of that fact Steve needed. Here was Tony poking Doctor Banner with some sort of stick, causing him to jump in surprise. He really didn't want to have to deal with this today. Dealing with the Cube and Loki's magic stick and fighting off this Martian army was about all the excitement he really could stomach. He probably should have just taken a bottle of Advil with him like Holly told him to. Battle wounds he could handle. This headache? "Hey! Are you nuts?"

"Jury's out!" Tony quipped with a sarcastic smile before turning to Banner, ignoring Steve once again. "You really have got a lid on it, haven't you? What's your secret? Mellow jazz, bongo drums, huge bag of weed?"

Steve exhaled sharply. What he wouldn't give for some of Holly's Advil right then. "Is everything a joke to you?" He silently wondered how much of the pain-relief medicine _she_ had to take just to put up with the annoying billionaire on a daily basis when they were together. He'd heard that love was blind, but he wasn't entirely sure that there was enough love in the world to be _that_ blind.

"Funny things are," he said matter-of-factly, pointing the sharp object at Steve.

"Threatening the safety of everyone on this ship isn't funny." Steve paused and looked over at the silent third party in the conversation. "No offense, Doc."

"No it's alright. I wouldn't have come aboard if I couldn't handle pointy things," Banner said dismissively, glancing back at the object Tony previously jabbed him with.

Stark began walking away, gesturing happily with his hands as he approached another computer. "You're tip-toeing, big man. You need to strut."

It was official – Tony Stark was on his last nerve. "And you need to focus on the problem, Mister Stark." After a few more minutes of verbal sparring, he felt like he had to leave the room or risk stabbing his friend's son with Loki's magic stick.

"Following's not really my style." Tony popped a handful of blueberries into his mouth. He looked at Steve with a cocked eyebrow, daring him to say something.

"And you're all about style, aren't you?" Steve asked sarcastically.

"Out of the people in this room, which one is 'A' wearing a spangly outfit and 'B' not of use?"

With a simple command of "Just find the cube," Steve made his exit. As he walked down the halls in search of…whatever proof Tony's machine was already scanning for, all he could think of was what in the _world_ could Holly have seen in this jerk. He wasn't at all like Howard. Well, some of the male bravado was there, but that was something he could let go of. Being a man sometimes meant putting on a bigger show than the other guy to let them know who's boss.

Wrenching open the door marked "SECURE STORAGE 10-C", he gritted his teeth. These newer locks were a little harder to manhandle. He stepped inside the massive storage area filled with silver boxes and began to wander around. Tony was some sort of genius according to his file (and Peggy). Holly was no slouch in the brains department either, he noticed. While she hadn't told him anything past "designing uniforms", he'd seen the books on her shelves. Some of the things she read about were things he'd seen at the World Expo in '43. Particle physics? He had no idea what that even was, but she seemed to have a book on it - The God Particle: If the Universe Is the Answer, What Is the Question?. The title stuck out so clearly in his mind simply because he realized as he read the description of the tome on the internet later that it was _not_ a book on religion. Maybe the sheer amount of brainpower that appeared when she and Stark got into a room was enough to sustain a relationship.

Slowly opening one of the silver bins, he thought his heart would stop. Inside lay a gun complete with a HYDRA symbol and the helmet those goons wore. He grabbed the gun and made his way back to the lab. "Phase Two is SHIELD used the Cube to make weapons," he said, slamming the gun down on one of the tables. He turned to Tony. "Sorry, computer was moving a little slow for me."

Fury turned slowly to face his super-soldier. "Rogers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract. This does not mean that we're…"

"I'm sorry, Nick." Tony interrupted, cutting the Director off and turning the computer screen to face their leader. "What were you lying?"

"I was wrong, Director. The world hasn't changed a bit."

"You forced our hand! We had to come up with some…"

"Nuclear deterrent! 'Cause that always calms everything right down," Tony deadpanned, hands stuck in the front pockets of his jeans.

"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark?"

Steve began walking slowly towards the source of his headache. "I'm sure if he still made weapons, Stark would be neck deep…"

"Wait-Wait!" Tony interjected. "Hold on! How is this now about me?"

"I'm sorry, isn't everything?" He'd had his share of difficult soldiers in the past, but Howard's son was an entirely different breed.

"You're on that list? Are you above or below angry bees?" Tony mocked.

What in the hell was an "angry bee"? Weren't all bees angry before they decided to sting you? "I swear to God, Stark, one more crack..." Steve warned, pointing a finger at the younger Stark.

"You're a threat. VERBAL THREAT! I FEEL THREATENED!"

"Show some respect," the super-soldier commanded.

"RESPECT WHAT!" The room began filling with various arguments, making it hard to distinguish one from another. "Why shouldn't they guy let off a little steam?" Tony rested a hand on Steve's shoulder.

"You know damn well why!" He smacked the hand away. "Back off!"

"Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me," Tony teased.

With a threatening smile, Steve began to walk in a circle around his new least best friend. "Yeah, big man in a suit of armor. Take that off, what are you?"

"Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist," he said, slowly turning his head to face Steve with each word. He cocked his head to the side.

In that moment, the picture Peggy showed him of Holly at her grandfather's funeral taken for a newspaper article sprang to mind. If there was ever a picture literally worth a thousand words, it was that one. He wished he could shove that picture in this egotistical bastard's face. The picture showed her not as the woman full of life that took pleasure in sharing her knowledge with him, but as the girl who'd just lost her soul. He was sorely tempted to bring her up, just to prove him the better man. _He_ never made Holly cry. "I know guys with none of that worth ten of you. I've seen the footage. The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."

"I think I would just cut the wire."

"Always a way out. You know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero." Holly deserved a hero, and why in the world she cried over Tony Stark he'd never know.

"A hero, like you? You're a laboratory experiment, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle," Tony spat.

The urge to just run him through with Loki's magic stick was suddenly rearing its ugly head again. Despite what Peggy said, Steve wasn't fully convinced that this jerk didn't hurt her. He knew all too well that there were more ways to be hurt than with a fist. "Put on the suit, let's go a few rounds." He knew Holly would strongly deny that she needed anyone to defend her and would be strongly against him beating Stark across his hard head with his shield, but it would certainly make him feel better.

Their argument died down slowly and attention was suddenly focused on Doctor Banner holding the scepter after confessing to trying to kill himself. The computer beeped, signifying they had an answer as to the location of the Cube. Steve breathed a sigh of relief. They had an objective.

He rolled his eyes and grabbed Stark by the arm. "You're not going alone!" he ordered after hearing him say that he could get to the Cube faster.

"You gonna stop me?" Tony dared, slapping Steve's hand away.

"Put on the suit, let's find out!" Once again, the two men were toe to toe with no signs of either one backing down. This had to stop, or else nothing would get done. They'd never get off the helicarrier to get anything done.

"I'm not afraid to hit an old man."

"Put on the suit." An explosion suddenly rocked the entire room, sending Steve flying hip-first into the nearby countertop. He landed face-down on the floor. "Put on the suit," he repeated with a wildly different tone, looking up at Tony as he tried to help him up.

"Yep."

* * *

"What the hell?" Tony Stark gasped as the sound of the Hulk's roar brought him back into consciousness. "What just happened? Please tell me nobody kissed me."

Steve rocked back onto his heels and began to breathe deeply to slow his heart rate. "We won," he whispered, looking up at the sky with a relieved expression. He wasn't exactly sure what astonished him more – Stark's selfless act or the fact that he'd just battled aliens.

"Alright, yay!" the billionaire said between gasping breaths. "Hooray! Good job, guys! Let's just not come in tomorrow. Let's just take a day. Have you ever tried shawarma? There's a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don't know what it is, but I want to try it."

Thor looked up at the badly damaged Stark Tower. "We're not finished yet," he said reluctantly.

"And then shawarma after?"

Steve lifted Tony's left arm over his broad shoulder and pulled him up into a standing position. "Loki is still up in your living room."

Turning his head as far as he could, Tony eyed the Captain's ripped and bloody uniform. He let out a wheezing laugh. "I'm glad you survived, Cap, but you have to know that Morgan's going to _kill_ you slowly when she realizes you've torn her suit."

"_Her_ suit?" he questioned as he began slowly walking forward, allowing the younger Stark to use him as a crutch.

"I presume you know who made your old one."

"Her great-grandfather." Steve winced, realizing he was admitting his true age. "And that makes me feel a little more than old."

He laughed. Tony suddenly motioned for the super-soldier to stop and began pinching at certain parts of the fabric on the shoulders of the uniform. "Son of a bitch," the younger man huffed. "She's definitely made improvements since the last time I saw it."

He began to drag the technically younger man forwards. "Well, none of the seams ripped. She did a damn fine job of sewing it together. She's almost like Betsy Ross."

At the mention of the purported maker of the first American flag, Stark the Younger fell into peals of hysterical, breathless laughter. "If she ever speaks to me again, I am going to tell her you said that, and she's going to go postal."

Steve scrunched up his face at the unfamiliar reference. He didn't understand what mailing a letter had to do with Holly working on his uniform. "I'm going out on a limb here and assume that means she's going to be mad. But why would she be? I merely complemented her obviously amazing sewing skills."

"A computer _sewed_ it, Spangles," he deadpanned, reaching up and tapping the material covering the other man's bicep. "She developed that very material in a lab in college. Cooked up enough of it in my lab at home to make a prototype suit and threw bombs at it in the desert." He looked up at the smoldering remains of his name on Stark Tower, smiling wistfully. That wasn't the only thing they'd done in the desert that day… "Did you at least read the tag this time?"

"I-I didn't think Howard knew about the…"

"Oh he knew," he added solemnly. "He wouldn't tell me what it said."

* * *

**Author's Note: **Christ on a cracker, I updated...and it didn't take me a month. Truth be told, I had this chapter finished last week. Various things happened (went out of town over the weekend...decided to completely rewrite what happens after _Avengers_... Oops.) Well, this is here now. As for the subsequent events I chose to completely rewrite? I make no promises as to when those might appear.

As always, I don't own anything except for Holly. The song quoted above is Carbon Leaf's "The War Was in Color". (Found it through a Steve fan vid about the time I started this story.) Bits of dialogue were lifted from _Iron Man_ and _Iron Man 2_, as well as _Avengers_. Thanks to **TrickPhotography** for her beta skills as well as **BreezeInMonochromeNight** for being my "that's been done before" alert.

Can't wait to hear what you think!

Jen


	8. Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

_It can't be known  
What lies in wait  
For those of us in crippled states  
A broken mind is no escape  
When there's no one left to reason with  
There's no one left to call your name…_

Thanks to the advanced warning that the rest of Manhattan didn't get, personnel at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters were mostly unharmed. Non-essential personnel took shelter in the lower levels of the building, while Holly holed herself up in her windowless lab and remained in contact with her boss. What parts of her body weren't screaming for medical attention were screaming in panic.

It hurt, oh god did it hurt. It was starting to swell and turn black and blue. Pain never was Holiday Morgan's strong suit. A princess from a very young age, she cried every time she got a shot until she was fifteen. It would be her luck that some ship that looked like a roly-poly would grind itself into the street below and make the whole building shake violently, sending her leg on an awkward collision course with her gun safe and the rest of her straight to the ground. She knew the moment she hit the ground that something was horribly wrong. It'd taken her twenty-seven years, but she'd finally broken a bone.

"Gotcha, you little piece of shit," Holly winced victoriously after managing to pin her cell phone between the spiky heel of her left pump and the rest of the sole. She pulled the shoe back towards her, bringing the phone with the now shattered screen into her grasp. She shoved the shoe into her oversized purse that she'd brought to hang across her body in the event of her rescue. Her left leg lay bent awkwardly as a large purple and blue bruise began to quickly form over her kneecap. Thankfully, she was still able to unlock the screen and bring up the telephone keypad. She sighed in relief when someone picked up at the other end after she'd hit send.

"_S.H.I.E.L.D. emergency center?_"

"Oh thank god," she uttered through a deep cough. "This is Holiday Morgan. I'm uh…trapped in my office. I've definitely…" Three beeps suddenly filled her ear. The call had dropped. "Well fuck."

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Utterly exhausted didn't even cover what Steve Rogers felt. If he laid down anywhere, he might just sleep for another seventy years (preferably somewhere warmer this time around). Sleep could come after he got out of this hot, dirty, and ripped uniform and got some medical attention for the large cut on his left side that came courtesy of executing a belly flop on top of a parked car. At least it was over.

Limping in through the front door of S.H.I.E.L.D., he quickly realized that it was indeed not over when a tall, thin agent ran over to him.

"Captain Rogers," he began as he wiped dust off of his flak jacket. "Thank god you're here."

Steve groaned. "I'm headed down to medical to get this cut looked at."

"Before you do that, you need to go to the tenth floor."

"And why do I need to do that?"

"Because the emergency line just got a call from Miss Morgan."

His eyes widened as his grip on his shield tightened. He felt like he would throw up. "Is she alright?"

"All she said was that she was trapped in her office before the call dropped. We don't know if something fell on her or is blocking her way…" The other man didn't even finish his sentence. Instead, he watched Captain America take off for the stairs.

As Steve took the stairs two at a time, he found himself running through all possible scenarios in his head. She was clearly still alive if she made the phone call. Was she trapped under something? If so, he only hoped that he would get there in time. His experience in the Army taught him that limbs trapped under things could mean nerve damage and loss of circulation if not tended to in time. Had she hit her head?

Finally reaching the tenth floor after what seemed like an eternity, he shoved open the heavy metal door that opened into the elevator lobby from the staircase. His heart sank when he saw the lifeless body of one of the Chitauri soldiers in the middle of the floor with its weapon facing Holly's open office door. "Oh god," he whispered sadly. When he heard the unmistakable sound of a round being chambered in a gun, he froze in place. "Holly?" he called. "Are you here?"

"Steve? Steve, is that you?" a hoarse voice called from inside the office.

"Yeah, it's me!" Breaking the threshold of the smoke and dust filled office, he breathed a sigh of relief when he saw her sitting on the floor. He dropped to the ground beside her and pulled her in for an awkward hug.

"I wasn't exactly expecting them to send you when I called, but I'll take what assistance I can get." Before he could respond, Holly gasped and instinctively reached out to touch him when she caught sight of the large rip in his uniform. "You ruined my uniform!" she screeched, touching the bloody rip on his right shoulder and the scorched and still bleeding rip just below his left pectoral muscle.

He couldn't help but grin. Stark was right, as much as he hated to admit it. The city was in ruins, she was obviously injured, and all she seemed to care about was him…and the uniform. "Speaking of this uniform, I couldn't help but notice that it's considerably more form-fitting than the one your great-grandfather made. Care to explain that?"

Her eyes roamed up and down her spangled creation, nodding in approval at the way the material-covered armor only served to make his broad chest look bigger…and the way that the bottoms (especially as he was kneeling) made his butt look like she could bounce quarters off it. "Nope. Not really, no." She cocked an eyebrow. "Did you read the tag this time?"

_What is it with people and tags lately?_ "I-I had to throw it on in a hurry. There wasn't time." When he looked away sheepishly, his eyes fell upon a familiar sight. "And just where did you get that?" he asked, pointing at the old M-1 rifle laying at her side. "Those aren't standard issue anymore."

Despite her pain, she couldn't help but smile. She picked up the rifle and pointed to a place on the worn stock where someone had carved something. When she heard him read out "Lieutenant Michael Morgan" softly, she clutched the gun to her chest protectively for a moment before setting it back on the ground. "It's still useful. Just ask your little alien buddy in the hallway."

Well, at least he knew how the bastard met his end. "Good to know. Now come on, let's get you up."

She let out a pained laugh. "That's going to be difficult," she admitted, motioning toward her left leg. "I have no personal experience in the area, but I'm pretty sure that I've broken something."

Steve squeezed his eyes shut for a second before reopening them. That definitely wasn't good. Glancing up at her face, he realized she'd been crying. Her makeup was smudged, and there were faint black tear tracks on her cheeks. He shook off his gloves and gently moved to get a closer look at her leg. He touched the now rapidly swelling black, blue, _and_ purple area around her knee.

She bit down on her lower lip, stifling a pained cry as he gently felt for broken bones. When his calloused fingers ghosted over her knee, she couldn't hold it in anymore. "Oh god, it hurts so bad," she cried, tears streaming down her face again.

"C-Can you move it at all?" The quick shake of her head was all he needed. "Look at me," he commanded softly, tilting her chin up so he looked down into her dark eyes as he slipped back into Captain America mode briefly. "Do you have anything in here we can make a splint out of? Rope, pieces of wood…"

"I don't have any rope. The only wood I've got in here is some blocks to prop things up with." Thinking quickly, she removed her blouse to reveal a black tank top underneath and began ripping the sleeves off. "They're going to have to completely renovate this office after all this anyway. Will the legs on that chair work?"

A few minutes later, Holly looked triumphantly up at Steve after tightening the last knot on her shirt sleeve around the two chair legs that surrounded her knee. "Not my finest work by far, but I think it'll serve our purposes."

He smiled briefly. "Ready to go?" At her nod, he slipped his shield onto his left arm. He managed to summon one last burst of strength to lift his friend into his arms.

"How exactly are we…" Her sentence was cut short when he shifted her onto his back and nudged her to wrap her good leg around his hip.

The pain only intensified with the added weight, but what use was a super-soldier to anyone if he couldn't help the damsel in distress? He softly promised her as he carried her down to the medical bay that he wouldn't tell anyone he saw the strong woman cry, even though she was in excruciating pain and had every right to. If anyone asked, she got dirt in her eyes.

"Hang on, turn your back to the door. I can kick it open with my good leg," Holly offered as they finally reached the door to the lobby. She grunted as she brought her right foot, still clad in an orange pump while her left shoe hung precariously out of her bag, into contact with the door handle to open it. As Steve carefully made his way through the tight doorway, she sniffled and laid her head down on his rubble-covered, sweat-soaked shoulder pad. "Oh my _god_, please let them give me some serious pain pills."

"We'll cross that bridge when we get you down there, okay?" Once he'd managed to make it down to medical, Steve sighed in relief after safely depositing his friend into the first wheelchair he found. He carefully adjusted the footrest to accommodate her injured leg. When he heard her call his name softly, he moved to crouch in front of the wheelchair.

But Steve wasn't the only one to hear her voice. Tony, who had been drug along at the insistence of Director Fury to make sure that nothing had happened to him during his brief stint on the other side of the universe, spun around and stopped cold.

"I uh… I just wanted to thank you, Steve. Thanks for coming to get me…and for everything else," she whispered, taking his hand in hers and giving it a gentle squeeze.

"I-I can't take all the…"

She shook her head. "Can't you just say 'you're welcome' for once?"

Feeling a hand on his shoulder, he turned around to see a doctor motioning toward himself and Holly. He stepped away and allowed the stranger to push her wheelchair away. A nurse directed him to an exam table a moment later.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Tony gathered that the Capsicle and Holly had been spending some time together, or so Phil Coulson told him, but the sheer amount of time had been clearly underestimated. There before his eyes was Holly, covered in dust with…chair legs around her leg tied together with what used to be an expensive blouse. …And Spangles holding her hand as she cried.

Subconsciously, his blood began to boil. The man his father never shut the hell up about was taking care of _his_ Holly. His dark eyes shot to the ground. Where had that thought come from? She hadn't been _his Holly_ in years. The Captain had once again proved himself to be every bit the knight in shining armor that his father always knew he was.

"You look…troubled," a voice said suddenly.

Tony turned quickly toward the voice, relieved to see Doctor Banner back to his normal size and attire. "Just thinking," he replied dismissively.

"Uh huh," the scientist mumbled. "And if you could suddenly shoot daggers out of your eyes, Rogers and the girl he carried in here would be dead."

Tony clenched his fists several times, completely at a loss for where this feeling was coming from. It may have come from the fact that he _never _saw her so vulnerable in all the time he'd known her. The only times he'd seen her cry was when she held him after he was brought home from Afghanistan and then when she left him. She never let him see her hurting. Despite everything, he couldn't help but feel like he should have done more to protect her, to take her to safety. "It's nothing."

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

When Holly was wheeled out of the x-ray room with a slightly better splint than a torn shirt and two chair legs, Steve jumped off the exam table and made his way toward her. "A-Are you going to be okay?"

"Eventually," she replied with a sigh of regret as she tugged at the white hospital gown she'd been changed into. "After some surgery, four to six weeks in a…rather large cast, and some physical therapy." A smile suddenly crossed her face and she failed to stifle a giggle. "They gave me something to make me feel awesome. I don't even know why I'm laughing. I'm about to go have surgery to fix my…what was it, doc?"

"A displaced patella fracture," the man pushing her wheelchair deadpanned. He clearly wasn't as amused as the patient.

Kneeling down by the side of the wheelchair, he gave her right shoulder a gentle squeeze when a worried look crossed her face. "I'll be here when you wake up, okay?"

She up and laid her hand atop his, gripping two of his gloved fingers tightly. "Thanks." She let go of his hand reluctantly when the wheelchair began to move. Her eyes never left his until she was pushed into another room.

"Cap, you're not going to do her any favors by just waiting. Tony's managed to convince the shawarma restaurant owners to open for us."

Steve turned around to find Doctor Banner standing behind him. "I'm fine…"

The shorter man raised an eyebrow. "I've read the notes, Steve. You need about four helpings to my one. C'mon. Shawarma can't be that bad."

After glancing over his shoulder to where Holly had been taken, he turned back to his new teammate and nodded.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Standing in the doorway of what used to be Holly's office with his arms folded across his chest, Tony Stark let out a frustrated sigh. He'd been just standing there watching Holly Morgan sleep peacefully thanks to the heavy rounds of painkillers she'd been given post-surgery before he couldn't stand there anymore. He'd come back to S.H.I.E.L.D. with Rogers after the extremely satisfying, albeit silent, feast on shawarma. When the doctor told them that they'd have to keep her for a few days, Rogers had offered to go get her some clothes from her place.

"_Stark, can you stay with her while I go?" a fresh out of the shower Steve whispered so as not to wake his slumbering friend as he fished through her filthy purse until he found her house keys. He let out a long yawn. "She's… After everything that's happened, she doesn't need to wake up alone."_

"_You're up for digging through her drawer full of unmentionables?" Tony teased in an effort to make the other man blush. _

"_You don't even know where she lives. Besides, it's nothing that I can't handle." Crossing the room in two strides, he leaned against the door frame. "Now are you going to stay or not?" At Tony's nod, Steve left the room._

Sure, Rogers could probably manage to bring her the basics. He'd grab clothes that probably didn't match (or at least she'd refuse to wear together). He'd pr0bably close his eyes and just reach into her underwear drawer and grab Jesus knows what. Hell, he probably would find her cosmetics bag and shampoo, but would completely leave her hairdryer and straightener behind.

She'd inevitably ask for her laptop. She couldn't have changed _that_ much in four years. She would want to at least feel like she was doing _something_. He quickly climbed over the remnants of one of her state of the art machines to stand behind her desk.

If he were her computer, where would she have stowed it? She wouldn't have wanted any files lost, so she would have shut it down and shoved it somewhere relatively safe… His brown eyes fell on the miraculously still standing gun safe with the door shut. Smiling at his certain victory, he crawled over the pieces of ceiling and stood in front of the heavy metal box. He jerked on the handle, but it wouldn't budge. _Damn_.

Tony began quickly running through possible number combinations in his head. On a whim, he decided to try his birthday, 5-1-70.

Nope. He should have known that wasn't it.

Hers. It had to be her birthday. Biting the corner of his upper lip in concentration, he began to turn the dial again. 2-19-85. He chuckled softly as the heavy lock clicked open. His efforts were rewarded when he found a sleek black laptop still partially attached to its AC adaptor perched atop a pile of handguns.

He breathed a sigh of relief when he returned to Holly's recovery room that she still slept soundly. Rogers wasn't back yet either. He quietly set the computer on top of the clinical looking metal nightstand and managed to find a scrap of paper and a pen in her purse. No sooner had he left the hastily scribbled note atop the black computer, he heard heavy footfalls approaching.

"Did she stir at all?" Steve asked, setting the large duffle bag that might just hold the patient herself, if she were so inclined, gently onto the floor between the two men and Holly's bed.

"Didn't hear a peep out of her, Cap'n," Tony assured, doing his best to feign a smile. "Model patient. Grade A." The billionaire recoiled slightly at Steve's outstretched hand, but finally acquiesced to the handshake.

Tightening his grip on the handshake, blue eyes finally met brown. A look of understanding finally passed between them. "Thanks, Tony."

"Couldn't have her wake up, lose her mind, and then rip out those stitches could we, Betsy Ross?" he quipped before making a quick exit from the room. He knew full well why he was being thanked…and he'd rather not think about it.

Steve produced a fluffy blue blanket from the duffel once he heard the heavy door to the entrance of medical open and shut. He glanced over at the nightstand to make sure that the water pitcher was full just in case Holly woke up. Noticing it full, he began to wrap the blanket around his broad shoulders before doing a double take. Her laptop computer and power cord had somehow made their way into the room. As he slowly approached the bedside table, he froze when she moaned and turned her head to the side. Once he was reasonably sure she wasn't going to wake up, he picked up the folded piece of paper. It was definitely a man's handwriting, judging by the thin, spiky letters spelling out her name. It would be rude to pry, but he couldn't stop his brain guessing.

It wouldn't be from the medical staff, he deduced. They would have used a more formal tone of address. She never mentioned any family living in the area, but even if she did have any, they couldn't access S.H.I.E.L.D. secure areas. Agent Barton parted the group's company with Agent Romanoff as they left the shawarma place. Coulson…couldn't have left the note. And Steve knew that he certainly didn't leave it. The only other person who knew she was here and had access to the room was Tony.

But why in the world would he leave a note? He quickly reminded himself that it was rude to pry… The note fell partially open in his hand as he moved to put it back, revealing the note's closing – "Get well soon kid. –Tony".

Wrapping the blanket fully around his shoulders, he settled into the hard hospital chair on the right side of Holly's bed. He quickly positioned a pillow between his shoulder and the wall before propping his sock-covered feet on the bed by her good leg. The last thought that crossed his mind before sleep finally took him was that he'd slept in more comfortable positions in a warzone…

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Holly tried to adjust her sleeping position, only to be met with a heart-stopping wave of pain. Her eyes shot open and she gasped at the sight of her left leg not only covered in a cast from mid-thigh to ankle, but at its suspension from a metal rig.

The movement on the bed startled Steve. His feet hit the tiled floor as he flung off the blanket and appeared ready to leap into action. "Are you alright?" he asked, voice still gruff from sleep. The pained whimper that escaped her throat combined with her fists gripping the white blankets told him she was anything but. "What do you need?"

"To kick Loki in the motherfucking dick," she swore as a tear slid down her cheek. "I do still have one good leg, you know. Barring that, though, I'd kill for something to make it stop. Vicodin? Percocet? A gunshot to the head? Anything?" Her head lolled back onto the pillows with a relieved smile when a nurse made their way into the room with a paper cup of pills and some water.

Settling back into the chair, he wrapped the blanket back around his shoulders. S.H.I.E.L.D. kept their medical areas colder than the airplane flying over the North Atlantic. As he watched Holly swallow the pills, he rolled his head to work out the crick that set in thanks to his…unique sleeping position.

"You, madam, are a goddess. If I had any romantic prospects at all, I would offer to name my firstborn after you." She let out a pained laugh when the nurse rolled her eyes and smiled before exiting the room. As the high-powered drugs began to set in, Holly eyed her new surroundings. Her eyes fell on her laptop on the nightstand…and the note. She didn't have to even unfold the note to know who left it. She hesitantly unfolded the note and began to read.

"_Because I know that you can't sit still unless you've got something to work on. Don't work too hard. You're worse than me. Get well soon, kid. –Tony_"

"Was he here?" she asked, throwing the wadded up note across the room and managing to bounce it off the rim of the trashcan. The last thing she needed in her life was another note from Tony Stark. Some days she wondered how much trouble she could have saved herself if she'd ignored the first one…

Steve nodded. "The doctor said you'd be here for a couple days, so I went to get you some clothes. I didn't want you to wake up alone, so he waited here with you until I got back." When she didn't react at all, he sat up a little straighter. "S-Should I not have…"

"I appreciate the thought, Steve," she interrupted, speaking slowly as she carefully chose her next words. "But historically nothing good comes from Tony Stark and I being left alone together in a room."

"Dare I ask?"

Holly chuckled softly. "Well, the last time was about three years ago. I pointed a gun at him. The time before that was…almost a year before that. I tried to bash his head in with a socket wrench, and then I decked him."

Peggy had definitely been right about one thing. They didn't just "grow apart and ended things mutually". There was still something missing. "I-I thought you two were friends."

"We were," she admitted softly.

"Am I allowed to ask what happened?"

"We… We had a falling out. I told him to have a nice life and walked away." She squeezed her eyes shut. She hated not telling Steve everything. He'd find out eventually. Everyone always did. But if she didn't tell him, if she held this back, _this _wouldn't be between them. When she opened her eyes again, she could see his silent plea for more information. "Y-You've been here all night after you just saved the world. Go home, Steve. Go home and get some sleep. You're far better to me than I deserve."

"I think I need to stay here…"

"Oh my god, you really are too perfect. I promise I will be fine. If you're that concerned, just come back and see me tomorrow." When he finally left under protest a few moments later, she curled up into a ball as best she could with one leg hanging in the air and began to cry silently.

* * *

_May 15, 2008_

_Stark Industries_

_4:17 pm_

To say that Holly Morgan was stressed would be an understatement. Hell, to say she was mad, hurt, and upset would all be understatements as well. Clad in a harsh and unforgiving combination of a black pencil skirt, black pumps, dark floral print blouse (buttoned to the collar), and a white scarf, she stood with her hands folded across her chest and pored over her plan once more as she watched workmen carefully package the Jericho system into crates. In less than thirty-six hours, the crates would be opened on the other side of the world. The contents would be assembled, and Tony would make his pitch to the powers-that-be. Her eyes fell upon the three sand colored warheads being carefully boxed up separately.

_Step one_, she thought as she patted her skirt pocket, _cash this check._ The three large warheads had shells partially composed of her Ghost polymer. Okay, so it had been a little white lie when she told her thesis committee that she'd already been approached by Stark Industries to use her polymer. If a little white one eventually proves to be true (two years isn't that long), is it still a little white lie? She'd delivered enough of the polymer for this initial system a month earlier, with enough for nineteen more systems earlier that day. Polymer for twenty systems at fifteen thousand a piece? $300,000 wasn't too shabby at all. The strong possibility of at least another thousand systems? Ten million had an even better ring to it.

_Step two: buy something shiny. _The calling of the new Mercedes SL convertible was getting harder and harder to ignore. She smiled wickedly. The call from the dealership had come through earlier that morning. They'd have the black one she ordered on their lot in two days. She'd pick it up just as soon her billionaire boyfriend was airborne for Afghanistan.

_Step three: drive the aforementioned shiny car over to Tony's house and…_

"I see you started without me," a deeply familiar voice called out from behind her.

Holly rolled her eyes before turning around to face the source of the voice. _Speak of the devil and he shall appear._ "Not really," she replied sharply. "Just came to pick up my check."

"I trust you're going to buy something sexy with it," he purred as he reached out and attempted to grab her by the hips. When she moved away to avoid his grasp, his eyes narrowed. "Something wrong?"

_Today is clearly the day for understatements. He had _no_ idea…_ "I just came to pick up the check and give a mental middle finger to my thesis committee." Out of the corner of her eye, she caught him reaching for her again. "I have to get back to work. I've missed about a hundred calls just to take an hour to come get the…"

"…check, I know," Tony finished with an eye roll. "We should celebrate tonight. You, me, champagne, nudity…"

"Can't. I've got plans." Holly quickly stepped around him and began to walk toward the door.

"Tomorrow? You can come with me to Vegas for that…award thing."

She hissed softly and shook her head. "Booked solid with a meeting bright and early with accounting the next morning. Sorry."

"When I get back then?"

She pulled open the heavy metal door and flashed one last grin at the smug bastard. "Sure. Have a nice trip…" Once the door had shut behind her, she finished her sentence. "…asshole."

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

_Seventy-two hours later…_

Holly giggled as she shifted her new convertible into park in Tony's garage, popped the trunk, and killed the engine. Opening the driver's door, she continued humming the insipid pop song she'd been listening to on the ride to Malibu from the Mercedes dealership while she made her way back to the open trunk.

"_Miss Morgan, anything I can do for you?_"

"Good afternoon, Jarvis," she greeted sweetly, pulling a large suitcase from the trunk. "Actually, there is. Could you be a dear and download any personal files or files pertaining to Ghost on your drive and put them on something I can take with me?"

"_Certainly. Would you like me to leave copies on Mister Stark's server?_"

She shook her head as she punched in her access code by the door into the main house. "No, delete them. And make it so Tony can't do some creative computer work and retrieve them, will you?"

"_Is everything alright?_"

She tugged open the glass door and effortlessly carried the suitcase up the stairs. "Everything will always be alright between you and I, Jarvis. Between myself and your creator is a little more complicated than that."

Continuing to climb the stairs, her overconfident and gleeful attitude began to crumble. By the time she reached the top, the wall had completely fallen. She dropped to the ground and began to sob. Two and a half years of her life now meant nothing. She ignored the idle gossip. He said he loved _her_. She loved him. The whole thing, as she'd learned shortly before heading to Stark Industries to get the check, had been one big ball of lies. She should have known that it was all too good to be true. No way in hell was Tony Stark ever going to be anything other than…himself. How could she have been that stupid?

After a few moments, Holly finally managed to pick herself up off the floor. She wiped her tears and pushed open the door to Tony's bedroom. She let out another short sob at the sight of the bedroom. The pillows and soft sheets lay scattered across the room…as well as a discarded maroon dress shirt. Temporarily leaving the suitcase, she gently picked up the shirt. She immediately recognized Tony's cologne…mixed with some god awful perfume. Balling the shirt up in her hands, she tossed it across the room before suddenly feeling the need for some hand sanitizer.

_And one more makes thirteen…that I know about._

She sighed heavily. Retrieving the suitcase, she pushed into the overly large closet and began to quickly remove anything of hers from "her" spot on the rack.

* * *

**Author's Note**: Look! An update that didn't take me ages! As always, I own nothing. Thanks to **TrickPhotography** for her beta assistance. And for those who asked, we're now getting a bit closer to unraveling just what happened between Tony and Holly. (Just in case it's unclear, the end of this chapter takes place immediately prior to the events of _Iron Man_.) Soon, all shall be revealed.

I've got two songs for this chapter. One's instrumental, so there's no words. The songs are "Restless Sinner" by Black Rebel Motorcycle Club (the words at the beginning of the chapter) and "General Lee's Solitude" from the _Gettysburg_ soundtrack. Really great music by Randy Edelman for that movie. These both have been added to the playlist ( www dot youtube dot com / playlist?list=PLjgjKHy4ofeD7d1-R6eJ_GWIiGkQz56sn&feature=mh_lolz ) for your viewing pleasure.

Can't wait to hear what you think!

Jen


	9. Chapter Eight

**Chapter Eight**

_When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me__  
__Speaking words of wisdom, let it be__  
__And in my hour of darkness she is standing right in front of me__  
__Speaking words of wisdom, let it be…_

_August 20, 2008_

_Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center_

_1:45 pm_

Holly pulled the cuffs of the scratchy grey hospital-issued sweatshirt that was about three sizes too big over hands, crossing her arms across her chest. Looking up at the mild-mannered middle-aged woman sitting across from her, she sniffed loudly and wiped away a tear with the sleeve that sorely needed some fabric softener. "So how exactly is this supposed to work, doc? Where do I start?"

"The beginning is always a good place, I find. And please, call me Vickie."

She moved her head back and forth a few times before inhaling deeply. "Alright…Vickie. When you say 'beginning', do you mean like Oliver Twist 'beginning' where I go back to when I was born? I don't think we have time for that. I'm just here because Greg…Doctor Embry practically escorted me here."

She slowly moved her glasses off her nose and onto the top of her salt and pepper colored hair. "I see a number of his patients who are in…similar circumstances to the one you're in now. Did he tell you that?"

Holly nodded. "Yeah, he told me."

"Then you know that he's only doing this because he cares. From what I understand, you're dealing with a lot more right now than just what brought you to the emergency room this morning."

"I think that's the understatement of the year," she scoffed.

"Maybe that's a good place to start. I hear that these last three months especially have been trying, to say the least."

She began to pick absentmindedly at a bit of fuzz protruding from a leg of the equally oversized and scratchy grey sweatpants. "First Tony, then my grandfather, and now this. I'm waiting for Ashton Kutcher to pop out and yell 'You've been punked'."

"Well, you just got word that Mister Stark will be home in two days. That's a little bit of good news, isn't it?"

"I suppose."

"What are you going to say when you see him?"

"I… I have no idea. I don't know if I can even face him."

"And why is that? Are you worried about telling him what happened today?" When Holly nodded, the older woman smiled sadly and leaned forward in her chair a little. "That's natural. He's gone through a lot these past months, too. Adding this to the pile of new baggage he's undoubtedly trying to process too soon wouldn't be doing him any favors. He's going to need as much 'normal' as he can get for a while, and part of that 'normal' may be you. Tend to the living. The dead can wait. Let him start to see that normal before you tell him this." Folding her hands together, she tilted her head to seek out the young woman's gaze. "But that's not the only problem is it? There's something else."

"When would be a good time to tell him that I took all my stuff out of his house while he was gone because I was going to leave him the moment that he got off the plane?"

"Is that still your plan?"

"To leave, get out? I… I don't know. Part of me is screaming 'get out'. The fact that he went missing for three months doesn't negate everything else…"

"And the rest?"

"The rest of me… The rest of me tells me not to."

"Why?"

"Guilt, like soul-crushing 'how can I do this to him, regardless of what he did to me' guilt. I've spent every waking moment since I found out he was missing trying to learn to live with myself. This entire time, I've been asking myself could I have done something to help if I'd been there." Holly stopped suddenly. The tears she'd been holding back couldn't wait any longer. "If he died, his last thought of me was that I was here waiting on him, looking for him. And now that he's coming back alive, h-he's going to…" She trailed off as she began to sob.

Vickie pulled a tissue from the box on her desk and gently offered it to her. "He's going to what?"

"H-He's going to need me, actually need me. And after today, I… I may need him, too."

_Two days later…_

Holly took in a deep breath as her hand closed around the handrail at the bottom of the stairs. In the bedroom at the top of these stairs, Tony was waiting for her after three months of not knowing whether he was alive or dead. Her long talk with Vickie had helped some, but this was real life and not a therapist's office. Slipping off her black pumps, she kicked them out of the way and continued up the stairs barefoot. Against Vickie's advice, she'd come prepared to spill about her hospital stay…just in case it came up.

Pausing just outside the closed bedroom door, she began to wonder if it was a good time for her to come. She reminded herself that she had to do this. Swallowing hard, she turned the doorknob and pushed the door open gently. "Tony?" she called softly as she poked her head through the partially open door.

"H-Hol, is that you?" he asked before clearing his throat. Turning his head toward the direction of the voice, he smiled when she stepped into the room. "Your hair's different," he noted at the sight of her now-brown hair, patting the soft sheets beside him. When more tears began to fall from her already red eyes, he almost faltered.

She couldn't help but let out a soft laugh as her hands tightened around her small black clutch that contained only her keys, driver's license, phone, and hospital paperwork. "It's you, alright. Who else would open a conversation with that?"

"Touché." He pushed himself up into a sitting position and climbed out of the warm bed when she stayed rooted to the floor. "Come here," he whispered, holding his arms out toward her.

Holly dropped her clutch to the floor unceremoniously before quickly closing the distance between them. She sniffled loudly when Tony pulled her to him. Laying her head on his shoulder, she smiled when she felt the gentle throb of his carotid against the bridge of her nose.

"I heard about Michael. I'm so sorry." He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "How are you holding up?"

"Better now," she admitted, circling her arms around his middle. "I didn't think I'd ever see you again."

"There were a couple of close calls there..."

She lifted her head and cupped his cheek in her hand. "They said you escaped. How did-"

He groaned, pulling the clip out of her long hair. He buried his nose in the soft strands and took in the familiar scent of her shampoo. How was he supposed to explain the arc reactor and the suit? "Some other time, okay?"

Holly nodded gently, bringing her hand down to rest on the buttons of his dress shirt. "What the…" she muttered as her hand hit something hard. Frantically, she began unbuttoning the shirt. When she'd unbuttoned enough of the shirt to see a strange circle of light protruding slightly from his chest, she took a step back. "W-What's that?" she asked warily.

"Well, I guess you asking now is better than asking in the middle of the epic 'welcome home sex' that I've been counting on." He took her hand and brought it gently back to the reactor. "Remember that arc reactor in the factory?"

"The one that you can't quite get to work all the way?"

He nodded. "I got it to work. It's just smaller."

She shook her head in disbelief. "Wait, when the hell did you have time to do that? You certainly didn't have that in your chest before you left."

"I was supposed to be building a Jericho system for the people that took me."

Her tongue darted out to wet her lips. "So you're telling me that the arc reactor in the factory doesn't work exactly right, but you built that in a cave," she said slowly, pointing at the strange little device with her free hand. When he nodded, she laughed nervously. "Okay, shouldn't have doubted the genius, but it begs the question – why is it sitting where your sternum should be?"

"I've been dreaming of your ass for three months…" he moaned as a hand began to travel south from the small of her back...

Holly swatted his arm gently. "Tell me," she prodded. "Don't think I'll drop it."

Tony sighed heavily. "Because it's powering an electromagnet that's keeping tiny pieces of shrapnel away from my heart." When her expression softened, he pulled her back against him.

"Oh my god," she said softly as her eyes moved back and forth between his and the reactor. "I… I don't know what to say."

"I've been making Darth Vader jokes about myself." He twisted his face into his best Alec Guinness expression, eliciting a chuckle from her. "He's more machine now than man, twisted and evil." Tipping her chin up with one finger, he dropped his forehead to hers and closed his eyes. "I've missed you so much."

"I missed you, too." Her lower lip began to quiver as a lone tear began making its way down her face. Taking his cut up and bruised face in her hands, she pressed her lips to his gently. She smiled against his lips when she felt him returning the kiss. "Pepper sent me a message as I was driving over here," she said slowly after they eventually broke apart for air. "Y-You shut down the weapons manufacturing div-"

"Something's going on. I don't know what it is yet, but something's not right. When a bomb falls in front of you that literally has your name on it…"

Holly's mouth fell open.

"I've got to figure out what's going on."

"If you need any help…"

"I won't ask you to do that. I can't. If something happened to you because you knew too much, I'd never be able to forgive myself. When I find something, and I will, I'll tell you when it's safe to tell you." He closed his eyes, squeezing her so tightly that he was pretty sure the arc reactor would leave an indentation in her skin. "I love you too much to let anything happen to you."

She gently pushed back on his shoulder. "I love you too, handsome, but I still need to breathe. It's kind of important, you know."

He shot her an apologetic glance before stealing a quick kiss.

When Pepper finally made it back to the Malibu house from the press conference fiasco two hours later, the house was eerily quiet. Holly's car was parked out front. All of Tony's cars were still in the garage. She half expected to open the door, hear or see proof of boisterous reunion sex, and just turn around and leave again. But the house was _silent_. She couldn't even hear music playing or a television left on. Something was off.

She walked upstairs. Nobody was in the kitchen. Nobody was out on the patio.

She peered up the stairs and coughed. She'd go up just long enough to make sure no one was dead. There was still no sound as she reached the top and got closer to the master bedroom. Closing her eyes tightly, she braced herself for possible nudity. When she peeked around the doorframe, slowly opening one eye, she smiled. This certainly wasn't what she was expecting.

Holly, still clad in her black funeral dress, lay on her back only half under the covers. From the position of her hands, she'd fallen asleep while running her fingers through Tony's dark hair and possibly rubbing his back with the other. Tony (surprisingly also clothed) lay on his right side with his arms tightly around her waist and his head resting just under the bust line of her dress. His mouth fell open slightly and a soft snore escaped when he turned his head, burying his nose in the soft black fabric.

_Maybe it'll all work out. _She softly pulled the door to behind her as she left the room.

* * *

"Come on Rogers, you're almost there," Steve said through a heavy yawn. And he was almost there. He had less than thirty more feet to walk before he could collapse in the warmth and comfort of his own bed. Bed. He smiled tiredly as he turned the key in the deadbolt and pushed open the door to his apartment.

Flinging his leather coat across the back of the sofa, he dragged himself into the kitchen for a quick glass of water. He began unbuttoning his checkered shirt as he walked back across the kitchen and into the living room. He shook his head after a particularly deep yawn, only to see a tiny blinking red light out of the corner of his eye. Was that… He had a message on his answering machine.

He shook his head again. Maybe the light was a figment of his imagination. The early morning light might be playing tricks on him. Nope, the light continued blinking. He definitely had a message. That couldn't be right. No one ever called him, especially not on the landline phone. _That comes with the territory of all your friends from the war, save one, being dead. _Sure Holly called him from time to time, but she called on the cellular phone. He cautiously made his way over to the machine and pressed the play button, where the machine proceeded to inform him that the message was left yesterday.

"_Hello, Steve, it's Peggy. I just wanted to let you know that you're actually on my television screen right now. It's been quite a while, I believe, since you've been in front of a camera…_"

He laughed softly at her excited tone.

"_Your Holiday clearly has a flair for the dramatic that her great-grandfather lacked. My lord, you look more like a walking flag than you did in your old uniform. You'll have to let me know if she followed his example and put something on a tag. Speaking of Holiday, I tried to get in touch with her when I started seeing the news coverage, but was unable to reach her. When you get this message, please phone at your earliest convenience. I'd like to make sure you're alright. I'm far too old to go searching for you again, Steve._"

Steve tilted his head up toward the ceiling, blinking back tears. He snatched the cordless phone from the charger and headed into the bedroom. Quickly changing into a white tee shirt and some clean pajama pants, he dialed the number he'd committed to memory the moment he saw it in the file. He reclined back onto the bed while the line rang, sighing contentedly when he felt his back pop.

"_Hello?_"

"Peggy? It's Steve. I just got your message."

"_S-Steve? It's…five-thirty in the morning in New York. What are you doing awake?_"

"I'm touched at your concern, but I haven't been to sleep yet really. I take that back, I slept for a few hours in a chair…"

"_I happen to know that S.H.I.E.L.D. gave you an apartment. Why in heaven's name would you sleep in a chair?_"

"I made a promise to Holly, and I kept it."

"_Is she alright?_"

"She will be. She fell and hurt her knee pretty bad. They had to do some surgery, and I promised that I'd be there when she woke up."

"_She's lucky to have a friend like you, Steve._"

Steve smiled softly. "And I'm lucky to have a friend like her. She was a little bit put out that I managed to rip her uniform."

"_I can't imagine that she'd be too happy._"

"You asked about a tag. I looked as I was taking it off."

"_Was it as sarcastic as the other one? I trust she showed you._"

"Not even close. I think it was part of a poem, but I don't recognize it." He raised himself up from the bed and grabbed a scrap of paper out of his pants pocket. "It said:

' "The old that is strong does not wither, Deep roots are not reached by the frost." Just because a Stark isn't as apt to blow you up anymore, doesn't mean that this Morgan isn't going to do her best to keep you from getting blown up. –HRM 2012'," he read slowly.

"_Tolkien._"

He could hear the smile behind Peggy's response and let her continue.

"_It must've been a rather large tag for her to get all that on there._"

"The print was very small. I'm afraid I don't get the reference…again," he admitted sadly.

"_I'm sure she can loan you the series of books. She's trying to tell you that you're more important than you think. The rest will come once you've read the books. I wouldn't want to give anything away._"

The pair continued in conversation on various topics for almost a full half hour before his responses dropped off.

"_Steve? Steve?_"

No response…save for a soft snore. He couldn't see it, but an ocean away, Peggy was smiling.

"_Goodnight, Steve._"

* * *

Meanwhile in Manhattan, Tony Stark woke up with a start, his heart pounding. Pushing himself up off the mattress, he looked past Pepper's sleeping form and squinted at the alarm clock that read 5:30 am. He shook his head and settled back down into the soft sheets, wrapping a protective arm around her slim waist.

…But it wasn't _her_ face that he'd seen in the nightmare. It wasn't Pepper's voice pleading with him to help her. It was Holly's face. It was Holly's voice calling out to him. "_You always want to make things right. Make _this_ right, Tony, please._"

He sighed and pulled Pepper in closer. As soon as his eyes closed again in an effort to fall back asleep, they shot open again. Instead of the blackness of the inside of his eyelids, he again saw _her_ face cut up and bleeding. He opened his eyes and shut them again hoping not to see her face again, but it wasn't to be.

If he couldn't sleep, he decided as he quietly climbed out of the bed, he'd at least go be semi-productive. Shuffling to the elevator and down to his lab, he flipped on the lights and grabbed a glass and the conveniently located bottle of scotch.

"_Trouble sleeping, sir?_"

Tony hummed sleepily in agreement before flopping down in his leather rolling chair. He did a quick mental scan of the room. So far nothing appeared damaged or missing… "I think we need some music in here, J," he yawned as he poured a healthy measure of the brown beverage into the glass. He rolled his head around to pop his neck while the opening strains of Led Zeppelin's "What Is and What Should Never Be" filled the room. "Skip. Not feeling Zeppelin right now."

Turns out, Tony wasn't feeling the next ten songs either.

"Too bad I don't have Holly's iPod to steal anymore," he huffed.

"_Miss Morgan did always seem to have a playlist for every occasion._"

Point Break not only had a mean swing, he had a mean grip. He'd crushed part of the face plate of the Mark VII armor when he yanked it off. Tony didn't notice that the music had stopped for a moment, only to start up again with a familiar orchestral-turned-rock song.

"_I was searchin' on a one-way street. I was hopin' for a chance to meet. I was waitin' for the operator on the line…_"

Tony smiled as his fingers ghosted over the dents and scratches in the face plate. He hadn't consciously listened to Electric Light Orchestra in…well, in four years if he was being honest. "She's gone so long, what can I do?" he sang softly with the upbeat song. "Where could she be? No no no, don't know what I'm gonna do. I gotta get back to you…"

* * *

Across the island, Holly sat up in the hard hospital bed and blew a raspberry. The searing pain in her knee had been reduced to a throb by the painkillers. Her dark eyes kept drifting closed, but her mind just wouldn't shut off. Reaching over to the nightstand, she pulled her laptop over onto the bed. If she couldn't sleep, she could at least do…something. Waking up her computer, she pressed play on a playlist entitled "Working Due to Inability to Sleep". She quickly swept her long hair up into a messy bun before opening a new project window.

She began to move her head side to side in time with the old song. "You gotta slow down sweet talkin' woman, slow down. You got me runnin', you got me searchin'. Hold on sweet talkin' lover, hold on. It's so sad if that's the way it's over…"

If she'd looked at the sidebar in her playlist, she would have seen that she was sharing her playlist with someone else…

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

By eight am, Holly was showered and dressed in some of the clothes Steve had brought for her (a black tank top and a pair of black and pink running shorts). She'd also managed to put on a full complement of makeup. Thanks to her inability to sleep, she convinced the passing nurse at six thirty to help her shower…as well as give her some more pain medicine. The rest of her morning, she decided, would be dedicated to finding out just why Phil Coulson hadn't come to see her.

So when Steve strolled through the hospital room at just after eleven, he was greeted with a harsh stare by not one, but two women in the room.

"Agent Carter," Holly began, noticing Steve visibly tense up at the formal term of address. "I'd like you to meet Captain Rogers."

Swallowing hard, he extended a hand to the blonde S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who appeared to be close to Holly in age when she lifted herself off of the bedside chair he'd occupied several hours prior.

"Before you ask, yes, I am related to your Agent Carter," she greeted with a smile and an accent not unlike Peggy's, shaking the offered hand. "I'm her brother's granddaughter, Sharon."

He smiled nervously. "Pleasure to meet you, Agen—Sharon. I'm Steve."

"Aunt Peggy told us about you. I'd love to stay and chat, pick your brain a little as it were, but I can't stay. I only got back into town last night, but I have been given new marching orders. Popped in to check on my uniform guru. Some other time?"

"C-Certainly."

"Then I'll take my leave."

"So when were you going to tell me about Phil?" Holly asked sternly the moment that Sharon was out of earshot as she crossed her arms over her chest. "You know, Phil Coulson, my friend? I didn't know he was dead until Sharon offered her condolences for a loss I didn't even know I had. Imagine my surprise…"

"Holly, you needed medical attention badly. There was nothing I could do for him, but I could help you. They teach you to take care of the injured soldier first. The dead can wait…"

She felt her throat begin to close up as she clenched her fists. She'd been given that same advice once upon a time. Four years on, Tony was better off not knowing… Wasn't he?

Sensing her distress, he quickly crossed the room and tossed his leather jacket over the chair. "I'm sorry. I…"

"Loki did it, didn't he?" she whispered as a tear began to slide down her face.

Steve nodded sadly, sinking slowly into the chair. "I never got to sign his cards," he admitted sadly.

She choked out a laugh despite the circumstances. "Sharon owes me twenty bucks. She bet he wouldn't make it a month without showing you."

* * *

Steve gently helped Holly out of the car and into her wheelchair at the cemetery. The imminent danger was gone. Thor had taken Loki back to Asgard two days ago, but the ever-present soldier mentality just wouldn't let him rest…not yet, and certainly not with his friend unable to get around without some sort of assistance. As much as she may hate having to stay in a S.H.I.E.L.D. dormitory room because part of her ceiling collapsed from a nearby blast during the attack, he was glad for her being there for now. If she needed help getting around, there were plenty of people to help with that.

Sensing a gentle tug on his arm as he pushed her toward the small seating area, he looked down at his grieving friend. His first thought, as most of them had been since she woke up post-surgery was to ascertain whether or not she was in pain. "What is it? Do you need to take another one of the…"

Holly cut him off with a quick shake of her head, eyeing Tony Stark and Pepper Potts on the other side of the aisle between the two rows of folding chairs. "Let's just go sit over here. The sun's too bright over there," she said, her voice laced with obvious discomfort.

When he quickly followed her line of sight over, the source of her unease revealed itself instantly. She didn't want to sit too close to Tony. He guided the chair to the end of the opposite row, just under a tree branch, and lowered himself into the hot metal seat next to her. His right arm circled around her bare shoulders once she settled.

He pushed his brown aviator sunglasses back up the bridge of his nose after she laid her head down against the lapel of his military dress coat with a sniffle. He hoped that the US pin in the top section wouldn't leave a mark on her pale cheek. Her strapless, knee-length black dress wouldn't have been considered appropriate funeral attire the last time he attended one, but times had definitely changed. A soft black cotton blanket rested over her lap for modesty since her left leg had to be propped up. Steve gently rested his chin on top of her sun-warmed brown hair just in front of the expertly done knot at the crown of her head.

Pressing a gentle kiss to Pepper's soft red hair, Tony sighed. The crowd for the funeral was going to be sparse, that was a given. There were only ten chairs under the tent that sheltered the freshly-dug grave. He watched as Agents Barton and Romanoff took two of the seats next to himself and Pepper. Once pleasantries had been exchanged, he peered through his dark sunglasses to the other set of seats.

Holly's lean left arm fell below the back of the folding chair, her hand gently curling into the back of Spangles' antiquated military dress uniform jacket. He found himself gritting his teeth unexpectedly at the sight of the two friends in such a close embrace, undoubtedly whispering some words of comfort to each other. For the second time in three days, that traitorous feeling of "that should be me" began creeping into his thoughts.

When the former-almost-Mrs.-Stark shifted and the black silk beaded bow at the left hip of the dress appeared around the side of the wheelchair, he clenched his fist (accidentally pinching Pepper in the process). Could he really blame her for recycling a dress? Not that his ex needed an excuse to go shopping, but "the world almost ended and I didn't get around to it, not to mention I can't walk" was an excuse to not go.

But why did she have to wear _that_ dress? He released a breath he wasn't even aware he'd been holding. _Sure Tony, save the world and see her again… Only she's going to wear the thousand dollar dress she used as pajamas because you used her as a pillow after Afghanistan._ He forced himself to focus as the memory of just how wonderful it felt to…feel anything other than pain and terror came back.

A few minutes later, as the priest stood in front of the coffin that had been precariously perched over the grave, Holly closed her eyes and sighed. Phil told her once, a long time ago it seemed, that he had been raised Catholic. There weren't a lot of Catholics in Newport Beach or Malibu. The extent of her knowledge of Catholic funeral proceedings came entirely from Hollywood, chiefly _The Godfather _and _The Departed_.

Steve stood slowly when the priest motioned for the gathered to stand. The round clergyman in front of them opened a book and cleared his throat. Steve knew exactly what was coming next. Between disease, the Depression, and the war, he'd been to far too many funerals. "Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine…" He raised an eyebrow and looked down at Holly, confused.

"Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord..."

"The Sixties," she mouthed with a sniffle before turning her gaze back toward Agent Coulson's coffin.

"…And let perpetual light shine upon them. He shall be justified in everlasting memory, and shall not fear evil reports."

Holly bit down on her lip as she stared intently at the beautiful flower arrangement atop the oak casket. The priest's words slowly began to fade into the background as a sob threatened to escape. She silently hoped that one day Loki would be brought back to earth. She'd love to take a swing at him, and not just because he wrecked her closet.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

"_You look lost," a kind male voice coming from behind her observed._

_Holly whipped around, her long brown hair smacking her in the face. Her dark eyes met those belonging to the voice. "Agent Coulson," she greeted with a smile. She at least knew one person in the building. "I am actually lost. I have no idea where the cafeteria is…and I'm hungry."_

_The middle-aged agent in a black suit smiled. "I'm headed there myself. Care to tag along?"_

_She breathed a quick sigh of relief. "That'd be great, thanks."_

_He pointed her in the direction they needed to go, slowing his pace to walk beside her. "It's good to have you on board."_

"_It was time for me to move out of California anyway."_

_He couldn't help but pick up on the notes of sadness and regret in her voice. "Director Fury tells me that your great-grandfather was involved with Project Rebirth."_

_Clutching her purse to her side, she looked up at her new acquaintance. The world was still buzzing with headlines speculating the reasons behind her split from "Iron Man". The rumors ranged from the almost accurate (she left him because of the "super hero" persona) to the outlandish and completely untrue (one of them was secretly gay and the other caught them in bed with a lover of the same gender). All of these stories in the "news", and this man wanted to talk about her great-grandfather's involvement with the project that created Captain America. "He was," she replied proudly. "He fabricated the uniform. That's why I got into the family business you unceremoniously stole me from in the first place"_

_He bit the inside of his lip to contain his excitement._

"_Since you've clearly been in this racket for a while, tell me, are they ever going to resurrect the Super-Soldier thing?"_

_Phil Coulson cleared his throat. "There was a quasi-attempt two years ago with disastrous results." When she cocked her head to the side, eyeing him with a confused look, he absentmindedly checked his watch. "Harlem hasn't been the same since."_

_Holly's mouth fell open. She stopped dead in her tracks and grabbed the older man's arm. "Wait, that news report of a big green thing and a big brownish thing fighting each other wasn't fake?"_

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Holly couldn't help but hope that Coulson, wherever he was, would forgive her. This was a solemn occasion, but she was about to lose it and laugh. All she could think of at this particular moment was Alec Baldwin turning toward Mark Walberg in _The Departed_ and asking: "How's your mother?", only to have Marky Mark turn and say: "Good. Tired from fucking my father."

"Forgive, O Lord, the souls of all the faithful departed from all the chains of their sins and by the aid to them of your grace may they deserve to avoid the judgment of the revenge, and enjoy the blessedness of everlasting light."

She forced herself to suppress a smile at the memory of Phil running the entire scene over with her in the hallway, much to the horror of three new recruits on their first day. Of course, the Director would have to walk in just as she turned to Phil and said in her best fake-Boston accent "Unfortunately, this shithole has more fucking leaks than the Iraqi Navy." That took a lot of backpedaling and explaining.

"May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace."

* * *

**Author's Note:** Oh my god, it took me almost a month to update again. I'm so sorry. Same story, I'm afraid. Real life just gets in the way of fan fiction. As always, I don't own anything other than Holly. And thanks to **TrickPhotography** for helping me edit this. This is going to be a long author's note. A lot of stuff to cover.

Firstly, the music for this chapter. The lines at the beginning are from The Beatles' "Let It Be". Also mentioned are Electric Light Orchestra's "Sweet Talkin' Woman" and Led Zeppelin's "What Is and What Should Never Be". I've included all these, plus a clip from _The Departed _of the aforementioned scene in the playlist ( www dot youtube dot com / playlist?list=PLjgjKHy4ofeD7d1-R6eJ_GWIiGkQz56sn&feature=mh_lolz ).

Secondly... HOLY SHIT, _IRON MAN 3_! This note will be spoiler free, if anyone hasn't seen it yet. What I really wanted to say about this here was that I will be including the events of the movie much later in this story. I will tag my spoilers at the top. (Hubby just had _Star Trek: Into Darkness_ partially ruined because he was reading an article that DIDN'T mention it contained spoilers. I forbade him from telling me anything.) I may use some of the entire speeches from the movie (if you've seen at least the trailer, you have an idea of what I'm talking about), but I will make sure to tag. I managed to get hold of a link to watch the movie online...again to get the dialogue I needed written down. Originally, there was going to be no mention at all of the events of the movie here. I planned to be much further in the story by now. Oops? Well, to make a long story short (and not give away anything for the rest of this story), Marvel just did me a huge favor and set the stage for something I've been planning all along. No, I wasn't going to kill Pepper. Thought about it, but no.

Thirdly, the next chapter will be much more light hearted and feature Steve predominantly. Happiness! Hooray! At last!

One last thing... Depending on how long the next chapter is, the actual moment where Tony and Holly break up may be in the next one (two chapters from this one) or the one after that (three). Mentioning this because some folks have asked about it. I'd like to caution everyone that just because there is a reason given for things...don't assume that's the whole reason. We don't know why Holly was in the hospital or what she has never told Tony. *evil laughter* All will be revealed in good time.

Can't wait to hear from you!

Jen


	10. Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

_"May his soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace."_

One Month Later…

Looking up at her long brown hair in annoyance, Darcy Lewis blew a stray strand of her bangs out of her face as she tapped her foot on the hard floor in time to the music coming through her headphones. She had to do _something_ about that. It'd been far too long since she had the time (or money) to get it cut.

_Let's get together and talk about the modern age. All of our friends were gathered there with their pets just talking shit about how we're all so upset about the disappearing ground as we watch it melt…_

When Jane told her that she had to go with her to New York for a meeting with S.H.I.E.L.D., Darcy rejoiced (internally, of course). She could steal away during meetings and any other time when she had no idea what was happening. She could get her hair cut at some "hippie salon" to get her head massaged before they scrubbed the hell out of it and cut it to perfection.

Or she could be responsible and start scoping out Manhattan for various things she'd be in need (like where to buy groceries…and booze, the important things) of come fall when she made the move from New Mexico to Manhattan for law school at Columbia. It was so hard to be responsible when she needed a hair cut this badly.

_It's all of the good that won't come out of us, and how eventually our hands will just turn to dust if we keep shaking them, standing here on this frozen lake…_

Darcy rolled her eyes. What was she here to do, exactly? Jane had been in this meeting behind a closed, ominous looking door for almost forty-five minutes. She'd already refreshed Facebook ten times in five minutes, desperate for _any_ news of the outside world. Sadly, the only new story in those ten minutes was that her cousin's Corgi had puppies complete with a picture of the furry litter. Days like this made her wish she wasn't allergic to everything with fur…and everything that bloomed. God knows the "good kind" of Zyrtec could keep the itchy eyes and runny nose and sneezing away for a while, but it never seemed to be long enough. It might be if she remembered to take them when she was supposed to. She should hash tag this as #IDidntChoosetheDesertLifeItChoseMe #FirstWorldProblems #IWishHairlessAnimalsWereCute.

She really shouldn't have left her latest knitting project in the hotel room. There was something she wasn't allergic to.

Maybe Thor would show up again. As she bit the inside of her lower lip, she realized that wouldn't exactly spice things up for _her_ anyway. The God of Thunder would probably just wave to her on his way to ravage (or whatever word one would use for happy reunion sex with a god) Jane.

_I do this thing where I think I'm real sick, but I won't go to the doctor to find out about it 'cause they make you stand real still in a real small place as they chart up your insides and put them on display. They'd see all of it, all of me, all of it…_

Jesus Tapdancing Christ, if this meeting went on much longer, she could have snuck out to any one of a zillion salons on the island of Manhattan and still been back before Jane's meeting was over. Or if she were feeling particularly responsible, she could have found her soon-to-be friendly neighborhood liquor store. What was the point of this trip for her anyway? S.H.I.E.L.D. was supposedly the land of superheroes and spies, and she hadn't even seen fucking Iron Man. He was _everywhere_!She folded her arms across her ample chest with a huff. Was it too much to ask for _one_ piece of eye candy?

_All of the good that won't come out of me and all the stupid lies I hide behind. It's such a big mistake, lying here in your warm embrace…_

And that's when it happened. The ominous black door swung open and out stepped the most perfect male specimen Darcy Lewis had ever seen. For a second there, she thought her heart stopped and her ovaries exploded. Or was the latter because she was just so hungry? Whatever. He was so beautiful he literally caused her pain. She quickly paused her iPod, ripped out her headphones, and shoved the device into her oversized purse. Before she realized what she was doing, she licked her lips in appreciation.

Her specimen had to be six feet tall and some change, with sandy blonde hair and big blue eyes…and muscles to absolutely die for. She wasn't exactly sure why in the world he was dressing like her grandfather. Surely some finely tailored pants and a wife-beater would be more appropriate attire. It wouldn't hurt if he had a Labrador puppy in one hand and…some kind of manly tool in the other. Like my god, he was a walking spokesperson for Old Spice and Brawny paper towels. She watched as he held the heavy door open for a woman she didn't recognize who was currently making her way through the atrium on one crutch. This woman had _clearly_ been to the hair salon recently if her long brown curls elegantly pinned over one shoulder were any basis for comparison.

She was so busy staring at the man that was making her vagina tingle that she didn't notice that her boss had left the meeting and was currently trying to talk to her.

"Darce, are you even listening to me?" Jane asked, putting one hand on her hip. Her assistant was a great friend, but sometimes her head was in the clouds.

Darcy shot up from her seat on the uncomfortable bench, clutching her purse strap to her collar bone as she continued to ogle the new eye candy from the corner of her eye. "Sorry, making a mental note of something…"

"Of Captain Rogers' body," the astrophysicist muttered with a subtle shake of her head.

"Is that his name?" she asked in a breathy voice. She was going to have to try to get his number. Thank god she'd worn that v-necked White Sox tee shirt today. He hadn't spotted her yet, so she took a second and pushed her shoulder blades down to adjust her bra. Presentation is everything.

Across the room, Holly gave Steve's forearm a gentle squeeze. She assured Steve she'd be right back before slowly hobbling across the atrium to ask Jane and her companion out to lunch. It was only polite.

His eyes followed his friend across the room, growing to the size of his motorcycle tires at the sight of the dame he could only assume was the assistant that Miss Foster spoke of. And what a dame she was, full-figured and all. He quickly averted his eyes to avoid being caught staring.

As he cautiously walked over to where Holly stood talking to the two women, he couldn't help but smile faintly. In a time where "thin was in" as Holly said once, he hadn't once seen a woman who was considered "beautiful" that he wasn't afraid of breaking in half. He was honestly scared of breaking Holly in half until she reminded him that she'd survived two generations of Starks trying to blow her up as well as some aliens (granted, she was still recovering from the latter…). He opened and closed his fist several times as that familiar feeling of having no idea what to say to a woman quickly returned just as he thought he was finally learning.

Steve quickly found himself back in the moment when the aforementioned dame extended her hand for a handshake. He mentally kicked himself. If he hadn't been so lost and thinking about her, he might have caught her name if someone had said it.

"Jane and Darcy are going to come to lunch with us," Holly said with a sly smile, the fact that Steve didn't even catch Darcy's name didn't escape her.

_Darcy. Her name is Darcy, like from Jane Austen. _He understood that reference, but then again, most people did.

"You've already met Doctor Foster, Steve." When the super-soldier nodded in recognition, Holly gestured toward the brunette that had caught his eye. "But this is her assistant, Darcy Lewis. Darcy, this is Captain Steve Rogers."

The second that her academic brain processed "Captain Steve Rogers", the youngest of the three women (not by a lot) immediately had to suppress the urge to ask several questions. The political science and history student who recognized his resemblance to the World War II war bond salesman turned soldier, began to quickly check facts in her head. As far as she knew, his body had never been found. Then someone was wearing a highly modified uniform that was closer to his bond salesman uniform turns up to fight aliens with an exact copy of the iconic shield… Stranger things had happened. She did tase the Norse god of thunder, after all.

"Nice to meet you," he said quietly.

"P-Pleasure's all mine," Darcy managed to squeak out. She reluctantly ripped herself away from the man's gaze to follow Jane out of the building and back into the bright sunlight. The fact that the other woman and Jane had even continued a conversation didn't even register with her. Even if he happened to be another Captain Rogers, she'd be fine with it. She'd still tap that.

No sooner had they stepped into the aforementioned bright sunlight, Darcy realized she'd been abandoned by her friend and boss in favor of the woman with the crutch who'd clearly been to the salon more recently. …Which meant that she was walking along side the man she secretly suspected might be a ninety year old man stuck in a twenty-five year old's body. She cleared her throat nervously as she watched the stranger take Jane by the elbow and begin to whisper into her ear.

"Any idea what's going on?" Captain Rogers asked, cautiously stepping alongside his new lunch companion.

"If I were to guess, I'd say that your brainy friend and my brainy boss were cooking up some insane plot to turn modern science on its head. Since I can only make heads or tails of what Jane says about a third of the time, they could be inventing a new cocktail for all I know," Darcy quipped, unconsciously slowing her pace to match that of the strange man who may or may not be the mysterious Captain America.

"Well, I can't hear anything that sounds remotely like a drink recipe…"

She let out a brief snort of laughter. "So they're plotting to take over the world because…science. That's comforting."

"Well, if Holly tells me about it before they do it, I'll let you know. She's figured out how to explain a lot of things I don't understand with…unconventional visual aids," he added matter-of-factly. "If I get the nefarious plot explained with salt and pepper shakers and placemats, you'll be my first call." No sooner had the words left his mouth, he shook his head. Something didn't make sense. "Wait, I thought you were Doctor Foster's assistant. Shouldn't you understand what's going on? Aren't you a scientist?"

"Political science, yes. Actual hard science, no. I was the only applicant," she explained with a half smile as they continued to follow the two smarter women toward…wherever the hell they were going to get something to eat. "I graduated last month. Didn't have cell reception in the building where they had the ceremony, but when I got outside, I had sixteen missed calls and three voicemails from Jane screaming about aliens in Manhattan and Thor." Realizing she had an opportunity to stealthily find out whether or this hot meathead was Captain America or not, she chose her next words carefully. "So I went home and turned on the TV and boom, there's this beefy dude in what I can only assume was someone's attempt to bring the Captain America uniform into the twenty-first century."

"Yeah, I saw that," he muttered, shoving his hands into his pants pockets.

"Y'know, I distinctly remembering at one point during the coverage, someone got a shot of him with his mask off. Come to think of it, you look an awful lot like that beefy dude." When she caught a flush creeping up onto his face, she knew she had him. "And given the fact that you were the only person coming out of that meeting that I couldn't tell was an agent, a scientist, or Iron Man, I'm willing to bet my iPod that was you in the suit."

With a heavy sigh, he looked down his nose at the woman who caught his eye from across the atrium. "Do you have the security clearance for me to tell you whether or not you won the bet?"

Darcy rolled her eyes and fished her phone out of her purse. She pressed a few icons and brought up a picture before handing it to him. "Took this just after he smashed a mug onto the floor because he thought that's how we ask for coffee refills. Your secret's safe with me, dude."

Steve couldn't help but chuckle. "Diner coffee tastes that good to someone from another world?" he asked, handing her back the phone.

"Now pony up. Do I win my own bet or not? I don't even know what kind of clearance I have, but I not only took a picture of _the_ Thor and lived, but I watched him kick some serious ass with that hammer."

"Alright, fine. You've got me. You win your own bet," he acquiesced.

"So, Captain Rogers…"

"Steve, please."

"Fine. So, Steve, I can't believe I'm about to ask you this, but I'm going to anyway. You know the first guy that wore the suit was a Captain Steve Rogers, too, right?" She clapped her hands together behind her back and exhaled slowly. Her bravado and earlier plan to try to trap him into an answer blew away with the last gust of a late spring breeze. "There's no way to say this and not sound like a really weird person. Uh, I know they haven't cloned humans and published the results, so… Are you, uh…you know, him?"

He had to hand it to her. She was certainly quick on the draw, but she'd said that she was a political science major. If she hadn't covered him at some point in her studies, he'd be more surprised. When he woke up, he was shocked to find that people were still talking about him. After a couple months, he was still getting used to it. "Yup."

Darcy froze in the middle of the sidewalk. She'd expected that he was the guy running around the previous month fighting aliens. She half expected him to give the answer he did, but getting the verbal confirmation was almost too much. She grabbed his forearm, fighting to keep her eyes trained on his…impossibly blue ones instead of having them roll back in her head at the feeling of oh so toned muscle underneath her fingers. "So you're…"

He absentmindedly ran a hand through his hair before shifting his gaze to the sidewalk. "Almost ninety-four? Yes."

"I was going to go with 'looking really good for your age', but sure," she said calmly with a shrug of her shoulders. "We can go with that."

"You don't seem fazed at all." Of all the things she could have wanted to say, _that_ was what she wanted to go with.

"I must've neglected to mention that I tased a god after he _fell out of the sky_. Nothing fazes me anymore, soldier." _Except your body_, she mentally added. _I'm pretty sure it's illegal in ten states and known to cause cancer in the state of California_.

Steve realized when he felt a faint pain in his cheek that it'd been far too long since he'd smiled like that. Sure, Holly had the same "nothing fazes me anymore" attitude, but he quickly realized that Miss Lewis…there was something quite special about her. He'd only known her for all of ten minutes, but then again, how long did he know Peggy before coming to a similar revelation? "I think Holly and Jane just left us behind," he commented after looking up and seeing just how far ahead of them their friends were.

"Oh shit."

"I'm pretty sure I know where Holly's trying to go," he assured, holding out his elbow and praying she'd take the hint. He let out a barely audible sigh when he felt her fingers gently coiling around the crook of his elbow.

On the outside, Darcy was the epitome of calm and collected as they continued walking toward their destination. On the inside, she was an entirely different story. On the inside, she was doing her best imitation of Lucille Bluth realizing that Gene Parmesan had gotten her again.

"So you're done with college?" Steve asked in an effort to restart the easy conversation they'd fallen into earlier. When she nodded, he did too. "What are you going to do now?"

"Well, I'm going to continue working for Jane through the summer. Now that S.H.I.E.L.D. pays her, she can pay me. And I'm going to need all the money I can get come August." She stopped her answer abruptly at the realization that she had begun to absentmindedly run her thumb up and down an inch and a half patch of skin on his bicep.

"And what happens in August, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I'm moving. Here, uh, actually. I'm going to start law school at Columbia. I somehow managed to snag a studio in student housing. Maybe the universe is returning the favor for last spring in New Mexico…"

…And maybe this was the universe doing him a favor, to borrow her phrase. Before he could even entertain the thought of inquiring further, he spotted Holly and Jane already seated at a table outside of the small café where the dame who liked to call him "Wireless Radio" worked. With a raised eyebrow, he caught the two scientists exchange some kind of knowing glance.

"Oh Steve, I got an email from a friend while we were walking over here," Holly began once Steve and Darcy (who had clearly gotten acquainted on the walk over) sat down. "She's got two tickets for the Mets-Yankees game tonight sitting at will-call, but can't make it because her sister just went into labor. She asked me if I wanted them, but Jane and I just made plans to look over some data tonight. Do you want 'em?" She couldn't help but smile at the sight of her friend's face lighting up. The Mets certainly weren't the Dodgers, but it was the closest she could get him to a Dodgers-Yankees game (unless she sent him to Los Angeles).

"I-I'd love to go, but that only solves the problem of one of the tickets." Looking up as Beth the Waitress began gently placing waters around the table, he failed to notice his new friend adjusting her tee shirt to make sure the White Sox logo was sitting squarely on top of her cleavage. He also failed to see the wink and faint encouraging hand gesture Jane gave to her assistant.

"I-I'd go," Darcy said quietly. She looked up at him expectantly. "It's been a while since I've been to a baseball game."

Steve's eyes snapped down to the unassuming girl, immediately recognizing the updated Chicago White Sox logo on her shirt.

"Jane and Holly need me to look over data. I don't understand it anyway." Waiting for his reaction was absolute hell. When he smiled suddenly, she let out a sigh of relief. God, he even had a gorgeous smile…

The two scientists exchanged knowing looks before Holly discreetly pressed a twenty dollar bill into Jane's hand.

* * *

_August 30, 2008_

_Malibu, California_

_9:28 pm_

Holding the Ziploc bag full of ice against his sore shoulder with his chin, Tony carefully began to tape it into place with some medical tape he'd found laying around in his bathroom. He couldn't stop giggling…and he never _giggled_. He could fly! His suit could fly! Alright, so maybe it'd still be fun to drive one of his sports cars from time to time, but he could definitely see the looks on people's faces when he popped out for a bottle of scotch in the suit.

The entire time he'd been airborne, reveling in the knowledge that he could now be his own plane, all he wanted to do was call Holly and shout his news the second he landed. For the past two years, she'd always been his first call the second he realized something worked. She'd probably drop everything and race across town to demand that he repeat his success so she could see. His face broke into a stupid grin at the mental image of her pouting when he inevitably told her that since she (thankfully) didn't have a circle of light in her sternum as well, she couldn't borrow the suit.

But he didn't call her.

It wasn't because of the fact that when he shut the thrusters off he fell through the ceiling and broke two of the things she loved the most about his house – the concert grand piano that only she seemed to ever play and the Cobra. If he called her gloating about his latest achievement, he'd have to tell her about the original suit in Afghanistan. He'd have to tell her about Yinsen and everything else. That was something he wasn't quite ready to do.

He plopped down in his rolling chair, half listening as Jarvis began to run diagnostics on the silver suit before chiming in with new specifications for the color scheme. Taking a healthy swig of his smoothie, he sighed. He'd have to tell her sometime, and he would…eventually. He needed to make things right before he did that. He needed to be able to tell her that it all meant something.

"_Sir, Miss Morgan is calling_," Jarvis announced, halting Tony's train of thought.

"Let it go to voicemail," he replied dismissively, taking another sip of his drink with a heavy sigh. Just as he tried to return to his previous thought, he realized he couldn't, not as long as Holly's voice filled the room as she left a message. His heart almost stopped when he recognized her shaky tone of voice.

"_Hey handsome, it's me. Uh… It's about 9:30. You're probably working on whatever you've been up to for the past week and told Jarvis to send me to voicemail so I don't interrupt you. I uh… I'm not feeling too hot right now, so I'm going to head to bed. I just wanted to call and remind you not to work too hard. I-I love you, Tony. Get some sleep…_"

"Jarvis, pick up. I want to talk to her," Tony whispered. Just because he wasn't ready to tell her everything didn't mean that he couldn't talk to her for a little while. "Hey."

"_Hey! I was just leaving you a message._"

He couldn't help but smile at her suddenly more upbeat voice. "Are you okay? You said something about not feeling well."

"_I've just got a headache that I can't shake, nothing major._"

"Did you take anything for it?" Small talk. He hated small talk. She hadn't questioned him about what he was up to. Something wasn't right, but he just couldn't put his finger on it.

"_Yeah, I took some Advil about ten minutes ago. I'm just waiting for it to kick in at this point. Maybe uh… Maybe when you're done with your little project and I'm done policing interns around R&D, you can show me what's been keeping you so busy._"

"Sounds like a plan. Maybe we can even go away for a little while. After all that's happened, I think the best thing for me would be for you to just not put clothes on for a couple days." When she began to laugh softly, he did too. He could see her face in his mind, clear as day. She was undoubtedly shaking her head as she pretended to be slightly annoyed but was still smiling because she knew he was right. They both needed to get away.

"_We'll see. It'll depend on exactly what it is you're cooking up down there_."

Tony slowly opened one of the desk drawers and pulled out the small black velvet box that had just been hand delivered that morning. "I think you'll like it," he retorted smugly.

"_Do I get a hint_?"

"Nope, it's a surprise." He quietly opened the hinged box, removing a large diamond ring from its resting place inside. "Now," he began, his voice softening in concern. "You need to get some sleep and feel better."

"_I'll get some sleep if you do. I know you. When you've got an idea, you don't sleep until you've built it._"

"I'll be in bed by one, I promise."

"_You better be. I love you, Tony_."

"I love you too. 'Night."

"_Goodnight_."

After she ended the call, Tony reclined in the chair, holding the ring up to the fluorescent lights in the ceiling and watching as the facets of the center stone reflected the light onto the silver suit. Holly still had another two and a half weeks with the interns at Morgan. He had until then to make everything right.

Once he had, he'd show her the suit, tell her everything, and deliver a long overdue marriage proposal. Three months in a cave certainly can make one reorder their priorities…

* * *

**Author's Note: **Ack! I'm sorry. It took me a month to update again. Sadly, my excuses are the same as always. I'm extremely close to finishing a hand knit baby blanket for my boss' newborn. Been working on the blanket since New Years when she was born, so yeah, I'm stress knitting at this point. On top of that, I've been feeling...down lately. I actually split this chapter in half. I had this part done, and the rest was a first draft. I decided to split it so that you guys could get an update.

As promised, I am working to get Steve a girlfriend. It's not Beth the Waitress as someone hoped a few chapters ago. I just love Darcy. (That, and Kat Dennings on "2 Broke Girls". If you've worked in the restaurant industry, especially as long as I have, soooo much of that show is true.) The next chapter will be absolute "Steve and Darcy baseball fluff" (with possibly two female science nerds sneaking off and getting the giggles as only shots can provide). I promise. The chapter after that (sorry I keep pushing this back) will be...some very old demons returning for our ill-fated Tony and Holly. As this story continues to twist and turn, we will be switching back and forth between Steve and Darcy, Holly, Pepper and Tony, and eventually some sort of Holly and Tony..."quagmire" for lack of a better word. Oh, and somewhere between Pepper/Tony and Holly/Tony will be the events of "Iron Man 3".

There isn't a song for this chapter persay, but if you check out the playlist (youtube dot com / playlist?list=PLjgjKHy4ofeD7d1-R6eJ_GWIiGkQz56sn&feature=mh_lolz)... Yeah. The song Darcy's listening to is "The Good That Won't Come Out" by Rilo Kiley. And there's also a clip of Lucille Bluth from _Arrested Development_ doing the hand motion described earlier.

As always, I don't own anything. And many thanks to **TrickPhotography** for giving this a look to make sure I didn't miss anything.

Thanks so much for sticking with me, guys. It really means a lot. Don't forget to let me know what you think.

Jen


	11. Chapter Ten

**Chapter Ten**

"You see, there's no guilt in baseball and it's never boring ... which makes it like sex… What they give me lasts one hundred forty-two games. Sometimes it seems like a bad trade. But bad trades are part of baseball - now who can forget Frank Robinson for Milt Pappas, for God's sake? It's a long season and you gotta trust. I've tried 'em all, I really have, and the only church that truly feeds the soul is the Church of Baseball."

-Anne Savoy, _Bull Durham_

The remainder of lunch had proceeded…fairly normally, at least in Steve's best estimations. He hadn't made any "wireless radio" style slips at least. He didn't even get overly excited about catching the occasional pop culture reference tossed around. (While dealing with a bout of insomnia, he stumbled upon a re-run of a television show called "Tosh.O" and didn't quite understand why the host was making fun of a football player for praying…until he used the power of Google.) Admittedly, he was saddened to learn that the old Polo Grounds had been torn down and that they would be going to Queens for the game.

Miss Lewis had programmed her cell phone number into his phone. She'd made it clear that she didn't have any other plans until it was time to go to the baseball game. Just as he began to struggle internally with whether or not to ask if she'd like him to show her around her soon-to-be home, duty called…in the form of Director Fury.

"I…I've got to go," he admitted begrudgingly as he ended the call and shoved the phone back into his pants pocket.

"W-Will you still be able to go to the game?" Darcy asked, her eyes never leaving his as he stood up and pushed his chair back up to the table.

Holly quickly checked her phone to make sure she hadn't missed something. When the notification screen told her she had no new alerts, she turned to Jane Foster. The other scientist was just as confused. "What's up, Steve?"

He shrugged. "Fury just said they found something I'd want to see."

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Steve raised his hand to knock on the door to Darcy's Midtown hotel room three hours later, but quickly lowered it. The entire motorcycle ride from the S.H.I.E.L.D. warehouse to the hotel took five minutes in reality, but it felt more like five hours. The three hours he'd spent at there felt like an eternity. He should have just not let his curiosity get the best of him. He shouldn't have gone.

But what's done is done. What he needed to do was go home and sit amongst his S.H.I.E.L.D. purchased possessions and drink an entire liquor store worth of…anything (not that it would do much good). After he woke up from the ice, there had been a few times where he'd wished that he hadn't been able to wake up. The thoughts had all but stopped once he'd found he had a purpose in this new world. But after his visit earlier, those thoughts began to creep back in.

He loved baseball just as much as the next person. He hadn't been to a game since before the Expo, as much as he wanted to. Still, he was going to be miserable company to this one. He should just let Miss Lewis down easy and go…

_Swiping his key card in order to gain access to the warehouse he'd been directed to, Steve was shocked to find Director Fury standing on the other side of the access door waiting for him. "You said you'd found something?"_

_Fury nodded, looking down at the stained concrete before looking back up at the world's first superhero. "When we pulled you from the ice, we pulled Johann Schmidt's plane up with you."_

_He locked both his jaw and his eyes with the Director's. _

"_Before you say anything," Fury cautioned, holding up his hand to stop any protest. "We had originally brought it back here to see what else we could learn from HYDRA for Phase Two. I'll admit that."_

"_Then what do you think I want to see?"_

"_In light of the recent revelation that the Tesseract can open a door to the other side of the galaxy…" he continued, partially ignoring the other man's question, "we wanted you to walk us what happened up to the moment where you said Schmidt died. We are trying to verify that. All we have is a seventy year old transcript of your radio call to the Strategic Scientific Reserve. We know the ship was powered by the Tesseract."Reaching into his pocket, Fury produced a small plastic bag containing some metal fragments. "And we also found something of yours."_

_Steve's heart sank when he plucked the bag from the other man's hand. It was his old compass, or what was left of it anyway. The glass covering the needle and directional markers was all but gone, presumably broken upon impact. The needle lay beside its housing in the bag completely detached and bent awkwardly. Turning the clear bag over and back again, he looked back up when he only saw a sliver of the old cover. "Is this it? What happened to the rest?"_

"_We don't know," Fury admitted sadly. "What's in that bag is all that we've found. It's possible that the piece you're missing is still at the crash site, but that site covered several square miles. It's doubtful that we would ever recover it."_

_Nodding slowly, he sighed. Seventy years of being encased in ice and changing weather patterns would have surely disintegrated the small black and white photo of Peggy if it had somehow survived the initial water logging. Steeling his resolve, Steve climbed the modern aluminum ladder up into the craft ahead of the Director. He quickly found himself having to swallow hard and fight the overwhelming urge to vomit at the sight of the pilot's chair… His own voice began to echo in the back of his mind. "__Peggy…this is my choice."The same feeling of bone-piercing cold that came when he touched his old suit in the basement of S.H.I.E.L.D. with Holly quickly returned._

"_Captain, are you alright?"_

_Much the same as when he'd hidden his discomfort from Holly months earlier, he shoved his hands into his pants pockets and nodded his answer. "I threw my shield at Schmidt, but it hit this housing here. Some pieces moved, he grabbed the Tesseract…"_

…But he couldn't bring himself to do that, to stand her up. Friends were something he was in short supply of, and she seemed like she could be a good one to have. Suddenly, the beige door opened in front of him just as he was going to finally man up and knock, revealing the aforementioned Miss Lewis sporting black plastic rimmed glasses, the same White Sox shirt from lunch, denim shorts, and tennis shoes. Her dark waves were partially hidden by an old White Sox hat and pulled back into a low ponytail.

"Were you ever going to knock?" she asked, biting back a smile.

"I-I was making sure I remembered the directions to the park," Steve lied quickly. He silently hoped that his stutter wasn't noticeable.

"Sure thing, champ." Darcy didn't believe him for a minute. The man in front of her looked like he was in his mid twenties, but in reality was a ninety-three year old World War II hero. He came from a much more subtle time. He would have double checked to make sure he had those directions before he left his apartment, if her grandfather was anyone to go by. However, she'd go along with it. She held up a finger, ducking back inside just enough to grab her oversized paisley print purse.

"How did you know I was out here?" What was it with Miss Lewis and Holly both having some kind of superhuman ability to know that he was waiting outside their doors?

She quickly jiggled the handle on the door to make sure it had locked correctly. The last thing she wanted was to have something get stolen out of the room and to end up as a basis for a _Law and Order_ episode. "I have super hearing. I used to sneak out of the house a lot in high school."She cringed as she shoved the room key into one of the outer pockets of her purse before zipping it up. "And that just made me sound really awesome. I-I'm sorry. Sometimes I just start and…"

"It happens," he reassured gently as they began the walk toward the hotel elevator. "So the White Sox, huh?"

"Yeah," Darcy began with a faint smile. "My dad's originally from Chicago. Grew up a fan so…" When he simply hummed his understanding, she began to chew on the inside of her lip as she beat him to the punch and pressed the down arrow to call the elevator. "So…when was the last time you went to a baseball game?"

Once they had stepped into the empty elevator car and the button to take them to the lobby had been pushed, Steve dropped his head into hands and laughed sadly. "Do you really want to know the answer to that?"

"I do." She quickly brought her gaze away down to look at the tiled floor of the elevator. Where had that burst of…whatever the fuck that was come from? As she looked up, she realized that he'd shoved his hands into his pockets. Well, she _did_ have to go and open her mouth… "Bet I can guess. If I'm wrong, I'll buy the first two rounds of beer."

He looked down at his date for the evening with a raised eyebrow. Part of him protested the bet, saying it was hardly fair. There was no way she could guess the specific game. The other part of him was itching to find out just how smart this soon-to-be lawyer really was. "Tell you what, you get the year right, _I'll_ buy the first round. If you somehow get the month, I'll buy the first _and_ second rounds."

"Challenge accepted," she laughed, borrowing a phrase from the fictional Barney Stinson. Lolling her head back and forth to pop her neck, she began to mull over information from various history classes. "I want to say that the first bond tour featuring Captain America was part of the fourth war loan drive for Series E bonds. That was January and into February of 1944. So your last baseball game had to be before that."

He couldn't help it when a snort of laughter escaped his throat. This girl was a veritable fountain of information. Maybe if this didn't go sideways, he'd go back to the store and invest in that Trivial Pursuit game he saw… "So far, so good. My last game was _definitely_ before that."

The elevator doors opened and the pair crossed into the lobby. "And since baseball season usually runs April to September, October if you get to the post-season…" She chanced a glance up at Steve. "My first guess is September 1943." When he shook his head, she swore under her breath. "Did I even get the year?"

He shook his head slowly as they approached the front door. "Nope."

"Shit," she swore again as he held the door open for her. "Didn't even get the year. September 1942?"

"Wrong again."

Darcy's musings stopped when she looked up and saw Steve standing proudly next to vintage motorcycle. "W-We're going on _that_?" she asked hesitantly, realizing that the answer was going to be yes the moment he produced a second helmet from nowhere.

"Is that not okay?" He couldn't cross his fingers with both hands full, but he was mentally crossing them.

"I've just never been on a motorcycle before. The guy who drove the school bus I rode to elementary school almost lost his leg when he crashed his into a horse trailer. But…" She trailed off when he turned to put the helmet back where he found it. _His body _definitely_ is known to cause cancer in the state of California, goddamn. _If she shut up and got on the motorcycle, she could press herself against _that_. "But I'm good, let's go."

Half an hour later, Darcy frowned into Steve's back when he shut off the motorcycle engine in Queens. For thirty whole glorious minutes, she'd been on the back of the bike with her arms tightly wrapped around her newfound friend's waist…his very trim waist. Pulling off the helmet, she had to resist the urge to turn the moment into a sexy shampoo commercial and shake her long brown hair. Instead, she simply handed the helmet to Steve.

"Any last guesses?" he asked while securing the bike and helmets.

"Uh… Did I even get the year right last time?" When he shook his head, she growled in frustration. "July 1941," she offered in exasperation as they walked toward Citi Field.

"Well, you got the year." He turned around when he couldn't hear her beside him anymore, unable to contain his smile at her awkward victory dance.

"I'll take one of whatever is the most expensive beer they've got. I'm not even going to try to guess the month. Do tell."

"May 25, 1941," Steve added with a heavy sigh, looking at the ground as they continued to walk toward the park entrance and will-call.

"Then you're definitely overdue for another one. Did the Dodgers win at least?" Darcy held a hand out from her side in hopes that he would take it.

Humming his response, he shifted his gaze toward the modern ballpark and cleared his throat. "Eight to four over the Phillies. Now I'm watching their rivals' replacements in a different borough. At least this park kind of resembles Ebbets and the Polo Grounds." He tilted his head and squinted in the sunlight. "Mostly Ebbets, though."

She pulled her hand awkwardly back to her side. "Wish I could say the same for the White Sox's new stadium."

He cocked an eyebrow as they joined the line for the will-call window. "New?"

"They demolished Comiskey when I was two," she admitted sadly, quickly adding "In 1991" for clarity. He didn't know how old she was…

"Shame. I always wanted to go to a game there."

"I was too young to remember any of this, but my dad said the moment he heard they were closing the stadium, he bought tickets to a game and flew all of us to Chicago. My brother was four and I was barely walking," Darcy reminisced with a faint smile, adjusting her glasses. "Dad said it was bad enough that his grandkids would never see Comiskey, but it would be a crime for me not to see it. I've still got the foul ball he caught." When she turned her attention back to her "date", she realized that he'd already picked up the tickets.

"I was listening," he offered, handing her one of the tickets. "Do you go to a lot of baseball games with your dad?"

Entering the main concourse of the stadium and its cornucopia of shops and escalators, she consciously moved closer to Steve to keep from losing him in the throng Yankees and Mets fans alike. "As many as I can. We don't get to Chicago a lot living in New Mexico, but LA's a three hour flight or a twelve hour car ride away. We loaded up the whole family and flew out there to see them kick the shit out of the Angels last month as a graduation present for me. What about you?"

Steve shook his head sadly, lowering his voice so that only Darcy could hear his response. "I wish I could have. He died in the First World War before I was born. My mom was never really into baseball, and then the Depression hit. Even when I was old enough to take myself, I couldn't exactly go very often."

"Oh." She mentally kicked herself for asking. He was a man from a different time. Not everyone grew up middle class with both parents and a dog, especially someone older than her grandparents. "I-I'm sorry."

He quickly waved away her concern and began searching for a way to divert attention to something else. The snack stand across the path from them provided the perfect way out. "I believe I owe you a beer."

Armed with fizzy yellow beers, a bag of peanuts, and hot dogs, the pair finally made it to their seats in the upper deck behind home plate just as the announcer instructed the gathered crowd to stand and remove their hats for the singing of the national anthem. Darcy knelt awkwardly to put her beer in the cup holder. Unwilling to put her hot dog (complete with ketchup, mustard, _and_ relish) anywhere near the ground, she shifted it to her left hand and placed her right hand over her heart as the man began to sing. She chanced a glance up at Steve, watching silently as he offered a salute instead of putting his hand over his heart. When the crowd began to applaud once the song had ended, she untangled herself from her long purse strap and sat down, taking a long drink from her beer. "You'll have to make sure and tell Holly thanks from me for the tickets."

"I will." He smiled and popped open the bag of peanuts, trying to hide his excitement that they were still warm as he cracked several in his hand. He'd found something else that hadn't changed while he was filling the role of a human icicle - peanuts at a baseball game.

"But I don't believe for a second that she had a friend miraculously call her about them on the way to the café for lunch."

"What makes you say that?" he asked once he'd swallowed.

"The twenty dollar bill that Holly passed to Jane when she didn't think we were looking," Darcy replied nonchalantly before taking a bite of her hot dog. "Pretty sure that's what they were plotting on the walk over, getting the two of us here. Not that I mind, of course."

Steve began to mull over her theory as the first official pitch of the game whizzed over the plate, a strike. "Why would they…"

"Maybe Jane was trying to make sure that I had a friend when I moved here. Maybe Holly was trying to do the same for you." She trailed off when Derek Jeter managed to hit the ball…right back to the pitcher who proceeded to throw him out at first. "Still not a Mets fan by any stretch of the imagination, but don't give these bastards from the Bronx that buy championships anything," she growled just loud enough for Steve to hear as she applauded the play. When she heard a chuckle escape from Steve, she quickly turned her attention away from the game to look at him. "I'm sorry. That was mean. You should hear some of the things I say when I'm watching games at home while intoxicated."

"It's fine, really." Taking a sip of his beer, he gently nudged her arm. "Baseball season will still be going on when you move here…umm…"

"I'll come to as many games as my schedule allows," she interjected. "Lucky for you, the Mets and the Dodgers are both in the NL. You'll get some inter-league play. I looked earlier while I was waiting on you to come pick me up. Your Dodgers will be here next month, but I won't."

His heart simultaneously wanted to leap for joy (the Dodgers would be in New York) and sink (his newfound baseball buddy wouldn't be here to go with him).

"I do have three years of law school to spend here. Wanna go to a Mets-Dodgers game next time we're all in town, soldier?"

The awkwardness between them melted away completely. "I'd love to."

"To baseball," she began, holding up her plastic cup of beer. "Players come and go. Teams move cities. The game's still just as beautiful."

"To baseball," he reiterated. The instant when the rim of his cup touched hers, he found himself extremely glad that he didn't go back to Brooklyn.

* * *

_Transcription of recorded interview between Morgan, Holiday and Everheart, Christine (for _Vanity Fair_)_

_Piece Title:__ "'The Da Vinci of Our Time' or 'Merchant of Death'?"_

_May 15, 2008_

_Malibu, California_

**Everheart:** Miss Morgan, Christine Everheart with _Vanity Fair_. Do you have a minute to answer a couple of questions?

**Morgan**: I'm actually on my way to an appointment…

**Everheart**: I'll make it quick, I promise. I'm doing an article on Tony Stark and was trying to get some background.

**Morgan**: I… I don't know if I'm comfortable with this. My relationship with Mister Stark is mostly personal.

**Everheart**: I understand, but I'm not looking for something you'd find in a tabloid. You also have a professional relationship with him. That's what I'm interested in.

**Morgan**: Alright. I guess I can spare a few minutes.

**Everheart:** Great! Can you comment on the rumor that once the Jericho demonstration happens this week there will be a Stark-Morgan business merger?

**Morgan**: [laughs] If it happens, it'll be news to me. Despite my last name, I'd much rather be down in my lab being head of R&D than in a boardroom making decisions. That being said, I'm sure that if something as big as a merger was to be in the cards, they'd tell me. Since they haven't, I'm going to go ahead and say that it's just a rumor.

**Everheart:** Well then can you comment on the rumor that you were involved with the Jericho development?

**Morgan**: I can comment to an extent. I can say that yes, I was involved. Tony approached me shortly after I'd filed my first patent about possibly using my material in a weapon. We discussed it and came to an agreement. I can't say much more than that, sorry.

**Everheart:** I know I said I was looking to explore the professional relationship, but I do have a semi-personal question. If you don't want to answer, don't.

**Morgan**: Alright.

**Everheart:** Can you describe a little bit about how it feels to be in a working as well as romantic relationship with the man that some have called 'The Da Vinci of Our Time'?

**Morgan**: It's great. I've learned so much from him. He's a certified genius, and that can be intimidating even after we've been together for two years. He can be intimidating in a board room. He can be intimidating in his personal lab. When he first approached me about this project, I was nervous. We'd been together for just over a year. I brought my notes and everything I would need to see if we could work something out to his lab at his house…and I was almost shaking. Professionally, it's been a true privilege to work with him. When you see his enthusiasm for his work, it's hard not to be excited yourself. I'm happy that we were able to get together on this project. I was admittedly concerned about the possible toll working with him professionally would have on our personal relationship at first.

**Everheart:** You say 'at first'…

**Morgan**: Up until the moment where I began participating in this project, I had only ever worked on team projects in school and within Morgan Defense & Armor. Leading up to this, the only thing Tony and I had ever worked on was one of his cars. We just finished rebuilding a '32 Ford the other day, but I think he's still going to keep tinkering. Anyway… I'd never worked with him in any capacity other than a personal project. I was worried that we'd get into arguments over the professional side of things and it'd take a serious toll on 'us'. After we got the ball rolling on my involvement in the Jericho project, I had a moment of realization. We never had an argument while working. A debate, sure, we had a couple of those. But as it turns out, I was worried for nothing. It was absolutely phenomenal working with him on something that he's passionate about. Sure, he was passionate about the cars that we've worked on, but it's different when it's a project with his name on it. Being able to share milestones, like my first collaborative project with someone outside of any normal business relationships, with someone you love is…surreal.

**Everheart:**What do you have to say to those people who think that you're only in a romantic relationship with him to bolster your own resume?

**Morgan**: I'd just point out the fact that we were together romantically long before this project got off the ground. On top of that, we've known each other for years socially. I knew his late father and mother as well. Now, I can't deny that this hasn't helped my resume. I'd be a fool to say that. This project is now something I can put on my CV. It may help me in the long run, or the topic may never come up again. Who knows?

**Everheart:** One final question for you, Miss Morgan…

**Morgan**: Make it fast, please. I rambled a bit too much, and now I'm running a little behind schedule. I'm sorry.

**Everheart:** Okay, fast. You just spoke about this close and wonderful relationship with Mister Stark. It must hard to keep being close when the relationship is so crowded.

**Morgan**: Crowded? I'm afraid I don't catch your meaning.

**Everheart:** Do you have any comment on the rumor that out of the thirteen _Maxim_ cover models for 2007, Tony Stark slept with twelve of them?

**Morgan**: Who told you that?

**Everheart:** I don't have to name my source. You know that. But I will tell you that the source is impeachable.

**Morgan:** Legally, you don't have to tell anyone, no. But when a libel suit gets brought up, Tony'll need to know the name.

**Everheart:** Do you have any comment?

**Morgan:** Go fuck yourself.

* * *

**Author's Note**: Well, it took me a month to update again. Terribly sorry. Good news is I've also got the next chapter finished. It's going through final edits as we speak, so it should be up relatively soon. Thanks to everyone who's reviewed, favorited, and put this story on alert.

Oh, if the date on the flashback looks familiar, look back at chapter eight. ;-)

(About the baseball game, using the power of the internet and the clues at the end of _CA:TFA_, I was able to pinpoint the specific game that S.H.I.E.L.D. had playing when Steve woke up. May 25, 1941.)

Anyway... I'm excited to get into "Phase 2" with this story. Can't wait to hear what you think. Thanks to **TrickPhotography** for catching my little mistakes.

As always, I'm only playing with Stan Lee / Marvel / Disney's toys.

Jen


	12. Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

_There's no salvation for me now_

_No space among the clouds_

_And I've seen that I'm heading down_

_But that's alright…_

_And I've been taking chances_

_I've been setting myself up for the fall_

_I've been keeping secrets,_

_From my heart and from my soul…_

"Ready?" Steve asked as Holly looped her right arm through his offered left one, leaning heavily on him for support as she reached back into the limousine for her much-hated crutches. It'd been almost two months since her injury. She'd gone from wheelchairs to crutches while wearing a plaster cast. The plaster cast had been removed the week before in favor of a locking brace to keep her knee immobilized unless she was working with her physical therapist. With no new mission and no Darcy for still another month, he had busied himself with helping his friend (who was still living in the basement of S.H.I.E.L.D. due to lack of available contractors to repair her ceiling).

"Me?" she chuckled. "I've been coming to things like this since I was a fetus. These things were always more my grandmother's bag. My grandfather used to joke that the Academy should give us Best Actor and Best Actress one year to compensate for all the pain from fake smiling. It's all a game." Taking a deep breath and releasing her grip on her friend's arm, she motioned for him to begin walking under the Park Avenue awning of the Waldorf-Astoria.

"Then you'll have to teach me how to play," he whispered, suddenly feeling ill at ease among the fabled Art Deco décor he'd so longed to see. There was no way he was ready to do this. He felt more like a dancing monkey in the tuxedo he currently sported than in the suit he'd worn to do the bond tours.

"_And those are your only two options – a lab rat or a dancing monkey? You were meant for more than this, you know. What?"_

"_You know, for the longest time, I dreamed about…coming overseas and being on the front lines, serving my country. I finally got everything I wanted…and I'm wearing tights."_

Sighing heavily, he went on auto-pilot and let Holly direct him toward the ballroom. Now he had almost nothing he wanted and wasn't wearing tights. Why did he ever tell Stark that he would come to this? Clearly he could have saved himself a considerable amount of grief if he'd just declined the already paid for set of tickets. He could have saved some for Holly, too. He wouldn't have had to ask her to be his "date" for the evening if he didn't cave into Stark's peer pressure. When his eyes fell upon a Red Cross volunteer checking people in before they entered the room, he remembered why he'd accepted.

Once the pair had been safely checked in, Holly paused to straighten her dress before looking back up at Steve. "Rule number one – smile. Rule number two – be polite even if you don't want to," she quipped as they walked into the ornate ballroom.

Across the room, Tony Stark gratefully accepted a second tumbler of scotch from the young bartender. Throwing this shindig had been the right thing to do. He'd pay for everything and give the income from the high ticket price to the Red Cross. Parts of the city were still in ruins…and it was partially his fault. He took a generous drink of the expensive brown liquid in his glass, letting the alcohol warm him as he looked around the room. Pepper was, of course, schmoozing someone from some committee or another. She was much better at "polite" conversation than he ever was.

He almost choked on his second sip at the sight of the next couple dressed to the nines that crossed into the room. He'd expected Rogers to somehow get his hands on a tux (probably through Holly since he wasn't exactly the most social creature), but what he didn't expect was for his ex-girlfriend to be on Rogers' arm. Well…as much "on his arm" as she could be while she was on crutches. Glancing down into his glass quickly then back up at her, he nodded sadly. Her voluminous nude dress hid the brace on her leg as the blue leaf and vine embroidery cascaded from the cap sleeves to her knees. As the pair turned to pick up glasses of champagne, he glimpsed the loose knot that held her long, dark curls up off of her…surprisingly bare back. He couldn't help but smile.

Holly smiled when Colonel James Rhodes waved at her from across the room. Motioning for Steve to follow her, she hobbled over to him and greeted him with the closest thing she could muster to a hug.

Tony couldn't help but watch her happily chatter away, presumably introducing the two officers. Rolling his eyes after setting his drink back onto the bar, he slid off the stool he'd been warming and crossed the room. "Rogers didn't tell me that you were his plus one, Miss Morgan," he purred as his hand, cold from holding drinks all evening, came into contact with the warm skin of her back. He let out a laugh when she jumped slightly. When she turned around, his heart sank. He'd seen that particular half smile before. She told him herself once upon a time that it was as fake as her then-blonde hair.

"I didn't know I was his plus one until yesterday," she replied with mock sweetness, motioning toward her dress. "This is off the rack."

He clapped his other hand over his mouth. "God forbid. I guess it's a good thing you're still…" Trailing off, he cast his eyes to the back of the dress before looking back into her eyes. "…basically a perfect size eight then."

Steve turned his head and looked back at Colonel Rhodes, who was struggling to hold a straight face. When the younger man shrugged in resignation, Steve again faced the display.

"Perhaps you should return to your other guests instead of guessing my dress size." Balancing her weight on one of the crutches, she put a hand on his shoulder and leaned up to whisper in his ear. "It's a size ten, by the way. Always has been."

"Well regardless of the size, you look wonderful." He gently removed her hand from his shoulder and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.

She tilted her head to the side and rolled her eyes. "What do you want, Tony?"

"I'm hurt, Morgan. I'd ask if chivalry was dead, but Sir Lancelot over there is the poster child for it."

When he began rubbing a thumb over the top of her right hand that had once again curled around the grip of the crutch, she gently swatted him in the shin with the metal support. "Lancelot isn't a good example of chivalry. He fucked King Arthur's wife and Guinevere blamed him for destroying the Round Table. I think that metaphor is best used _elsewhere_."

With a smile as fake as her previous one spreading across his face when he caught her meaning, Tony drew her close to him by putting an arm around her shoulders. "Fine. That wasn't the best of examples. But what kind of one are you setting for the Golden Retriever over there that you're trying to housebreak?"

"Knock it off, Tony," Rhodey warned. He knew his old friend liked to tease and get under people's skin, but did he seriously have to do it just now?

"I'd like to talk some business," Tony continued with a serious tone, only partially ignoring his friend.

Shaking her head, she looked up at him in disbelief. "Are you asking me as Tony Stark or as Iron Man?" she asked wearily. If he was asking as his alter ego, she'd have to listen. God, _why_ did she let them put in her contract that if an Avenger asked her to make something she had to say yes?

"Iron Man."

Holly groaned. "Of course you are. If you ask as Iron Man, you know I have to listen."

All traces of a smile left Tony's face as his lips formed a thin, straight line. "I'm serious. If you don't want to talk here, then name the time and place."

"Alright, fine," she resigned tiredly. "Can we sit down though? I don't think I can stand up much longer."

His expression softened and he pointed toward the nearest vacant table. His hand fell from her shoulder to the middle of her back for support. When she looked at him skeptically and backed away slightly, he put his hand back again.

She tightened her grip on her crutches as he began to cautiously lead her toward a table. She chanced a reassuring glance back over her shoulder at Steve.

"Want a drink while we talk?" Tony asked as he helped Holly down into a plush chair. He shuddered as his fingers inadvertently ran up most of the length of her back as she slid down into a sitting position. "Wine?" At her nod, he flagged down a circling waiter and ordered a round of beverages.

She began to absentmindedly pick at the corner where part of the embroidery met the tulle skirt of the princess-style gown.

"Why the long face, Morgan?" he asked, quickly plucking the healthy glass of red wine from the waiter's hand as well as his own glass of scotch. "I know for a fact that you can't be sad when there's Merlot."

Gratefully accepting the offered glass, she inhaled deeply before taking the first sip. "I seem to remember you comparing me to Heidi Fleiss after we did business the last time. You'll have to excuse my reluctance to put myself in a similar position again."

He sighed heavily before tilting his head to meet her gaze. "It slipped out in the heat of the moment." When she made her disbelief known by crossing her arms over her chest, he continued. "I find myself in need of a product that ironically only you can provide…"

Despite her reassuring look, Steve felt a need to stay close. Well, not as close as Tony was sitting to Holly at the table, but still close enough. Looking at the former couple with arms over his chest, he could almost _feel_ her annoyance from his vantage point. Then, he watched as the annoyance faded into her puzzle solving mode as Howard's son began motioning toward his arms and chest as he talked. Taking another sip of his glass of Budweiser (something else that at least taste-wise hadn't changed much), the wheels in his head kept turning.

"Nice to see that they still remember how to be semi-civil in public," Pepper Potts said softly, running her finger up and down the side of the cool champagne flute in her hand.

Steve turned around at the sound of the voice. "Miss Potts…"

With a polite grin, she waved away the formality. "Pepper, please." She shifted her gaze back toward the table that both she and Steve were eyeing. "I wonder what they're cooking up over there."

"Probably something that wouldn't make sense to the rest of us but will cure the common cold," he commented dryly, remembering Darcy's comment about Jane and Holly conspiring.

Nodding slowly, she moved to stand beside him. "If we'd stumbled onto this scene a couple of years ago, I could tell you exactly what they were doing. Did she tell you that he did design something with her once upon a time?"

Steve shook his head in disbelief. "No she didn't."

"It's a bit of a touchy subject now. She made part of the shell of a weapon for him. I-I don't know how much you've found out about Tony since you've been…back, but it was called the Jericho."

Jericho? Why did that name ring a bell… Suddenly a little light bulb lit up in the back of his mind. "I saw some footage of Sta—Tony on a demonstration in Afghanistan..."

"That's the one," she interrupted. Downing the remaining contents of the glass, she shrugged her shoulders. "The last weapon he designed. Well, I guess that depends on how you view the suit…" Her stomach dropped as she spotted a familiar blonde across the room. "Oh no," Pepper whispered.

Steve quickly set his glass down on the nearest flat surface and slipped into soldier mode at the sound of the panic in the woman's voice. "What?"

She began quickly fumbling for her cell phone. "Have you ever looked back on your life and realized that there was one person who just…threw a wrench in your life plan?"

"More than once," he replied sadly.

She quickly pressed send on the cold touch screen of the phone and pointed toward Tony and Holly. "That woman drove a Mack truck through theirs." Waving a hasty goodbye to the soldier, she grabbed the skirt of her gown with her free hand and began to jog toward the unwanted guest.

Just before she left earshot, Steve heard a name: Christine Everheart. He also heard the title of a magazine: _Vanity Fair_.

"So you want something like the underlayment of Steve's suit to go underneath the armor," Holly mused, grabbing a cocktail napkin and motioning for Tony to give her a pen. "Are we wanting full body suit like long johns or…"

"Preferably not that, but I defer to your good judgment. If it works, I can make adjustments."

Clicking the pen open, she began to sketch on the napkin. "Is a lot of the weight of the top of the suit more resting on your shoulders?" At his nod, she made a quick note with an arrow pointing to the shoulders in her sketch. "Do you need a cutout for the reactor?"

"No. The top's not what I'm worried about. I'm concerned about utility," he admitted as she began to draw a pair of pants.

"Utility?"

Taking another sip of his drink, he scooted his chair up next to hers to be closer to the drawing. "I've kind of got multiple suits at this point with more on the way. I've been tinkering with different ideas."

She looked between Tony and the drawing several times and bit the inside of her lip as she considered the answer. "Utility depends on how many pieces this is going to be."

"You know I'll pay you…"

Holly finally stopped drawing and dropped the pen to the table. "It's not a question of money, Tony. You asked as Iron Man. When you do that, S.H.I.E.L.D. pays me. It affects the strength of the underlayment. And you certainly don't want to sacrifice quality just in case your life may depend on it." She slid the crude drawing and notes out from in front of her and into his hand. She smiled as he eyed the black scribbles and nodded in agreement.

Tony slowly slid the drawing back. "We both should probably get back to the party before someone starts to think we're up to something. What are you doing tomorrow night at about eight-ish?"

"Nothing that I know of," she said after mentally going over her to-do list. "Why?"

"Why don't you work your magic with this in the morning and stop by the Tower tomorrow night around then and we'll go over specifics and pick a color?" Standing up from the table, he extended a hand down to help her up.

She quickly scooped up the pen and napkin and accepted the offered hand. "Maybe the Tower isn't the right place, Tony…" Once she found herself steady on her crutches, she thought her heart might stop. Her grip tightened around the pen and drawing as she squared her jaw.

"Go over specifics for what?"

Tony squeezed his eyes shut at the sound of the eerily familiar voice before turning around. When he identified the speaker, he instinctively took a gentle hold of Holly's elbow as a nervous knot settled in the pit of his stomach. "Don't answer her this time," he whispered in her ear as he began to lead her away. "She's not worth it, believe me."

"Are you two collaborating on another project?" the female voice asked.

He squeezed his eyes shut when he felt Holly tense up. This was his damn fault. He pivoted on the ball of his left foot and faced the voice. "Why are you here, Miss Everheart? You certainly didn't warrant an invitation."

"_Vanity Fair_ felt that the first social event after the attack on Manhattan should be covered, so here I am." Christine Everheart smiled sweetly. "So, are you two collaborating again?"

"No comment," Tony growled, using every ounce of self-control he possessed to keep himself from saying or doing anything that would make the papers.

"The last time you two collaborated was over a weapon. You're not getting back into weapons manufacturing, are you, Mister Stark?"

Biting the inside of his lip, he realized that he had to put his foot down. "I'm working on a personal project. I've run into a snag that requires Miss Morgan's professional opinion."

"A personal project like the Iron Man suit? Whatever happened to 'bricks and beams for baby hospitals'?"

"It's called a 'personal project' for a reason," Holly retorted sarcastically, finally breaking her silence. The only reason the reporter in front of her was still breathing was the realization that Holly came to four years earlier – she wouldn't last thirty seconds in a jail cell.

"Holly, don't," he warned. He moved his hand down from her elbow and curled it protectively around her waist. He could feel her begin to shake against his touch. As much as it might have delighted Tony to watch Holly beat the reporter senseless with her crutches, the last thing either of them needed was for her to get arrested for assault. Just as he began to reach for her, he caught a glimpse of Happy quickly closing in on the reporter's left flank.

The second Holly saw Happy's large hand close over the blonde's slender shoulder, she tried to slow her accelerated heartbeat. "I'll see you tomorrow. It was a lovely party."

"Where are you going?" He watched out of the corner of his eye as Happy gracefully escorted the unwanted guest out of the room.

"To the closest thing I've got to a home right now. I can't… I've gotta… I can't stay." When she felt Tony's steadying hand still on her arm, she shot him a pleading look. "Please."

Tony ambled slowly towards the door a few moments later, the effects of the two additional drinks he'd downed one after the other in the wake of Miss Everheart's appearance beginning to manifest. Had he not caught a glimpse of the living legend himself reaching out, he would have attributed the sudden feeling of flight to the alcohol. He quickly found himself outside his own party face-to-face with Captain Perfect.

"What in the hell was that, Stark?" Steve asked roughly, still holding the shorter man by the lapels.

Holly quickly ducked behind one of the giant marble pillars. She'd been fumbling around in her clutch looking for her keys. If she tried to walk down the steps now, Steve or Tony would see her (they'd definitely hear her, too). She listened in on the conversation.

"I should ask you what the hell you're doing carrying me out of my own party!" He moved to shove Steve away, his hands connecting with solid muscle. "Why aren't you running after your girlfriend?"

"Holly _isn't_ my girlfriend. Never has been," he commented. "What kind of game are you playing, Tony?"

"I'm not playing anything, _Steve_."

"Well, playing dumb certainly doesn't suit you." He glared down at him as Tony turned to walk back inside. "What kind of a man makes a scene at his own party with his old girlfriend?"

He stopped, whirling around to face Steve. "How in the _hell_ do you know? I certainly didn't tell you, and Holly wouldn't have." He sneered. "It's like I'm her dirty little secret."

Holly couldn't see her ex's face, but she knew the look that accompanied that tone. She never told anyone about her relationship with Tony because she wanted to be something more than "Tony Stark's Leftovers". Was that how Tony saw her now, "a dirty little secret"?

"Peggy told me."

Tony let out a sarcastic laugh. "Who got all her information second-hand from Holly's bitch of a grandmother? You've got some really reliable information there, Rogers. Two old bats who have nothing better to do but gossip across the Atlantic all day? You couldn't have done any better if you'd actually gotten some real information."

"How dare you talk about Peggy like that?" the super-soldier asked in a threatening whisper. "Her grandmother thought you were going to propose to her, not dump her!"

"Go fuck yourself, Rogers. You don't know anything." Tony resumed walking back into the party.

"What the hell did you do to her?" Steve called after him. "You must have done something for her to pack up her life and move three thousand miles to get away from you." He paused, thinking back to the conversation with Peggy. "She wasn't enough for you, was she? How could you do…"

She gasped, almost giving away both her position and presence when Tony rapidly closed the distance between the two men and grabbed Steve by the bowtie. Holly quickly caught her crutch that she almost dropped before it clattered to the ground.

Just as quickly as he made the grab for Steve's suit, he let go and turned away. He let out a short burst of breathy laughter to try to prevent the forming tears from falling. "She was more than enough for me, actually. For the first time in my life, I found myself thinking in terms of…something other than myself. I never deserved her for a second, but that didn't stop me from loving her."

Relaxing from his battle stance, Steve realized the other man was sincere.

"The only reason I'm telling you this is so you can get your facts straight, Rogers." He looked up at the clear night sky before turning back to look Steve in the eye. "That woman who started the scene you accused me of starting is the reason that _your_ friend isn't my wife right now. Before I got lost in a cave, that woman outright lied to Holly. Holly believed her. I had a moment of weakness. That doesn't excuse what I did for a minute, but that's what happened. After I got back, I asked her to marry me. Shesaid no. She found out what I'd done and left _me_," he ground out, putting emphasis on the fact that it was her decision, not his. Turning to re-enter the building, he paused and looked back. He saw the dumbstruck look on the face of the man he'd grown up idolizing. "If you want to carry someone out of the party, go find Miss Everheart and throw her into the nearest dumpster where she belongs," Tony suggested roughly before continuing back into the building.

Holly finally stepped out from behind the pillar when she watched Tony go inside out of the corner of her eye. "So, did Peggy tell you any other details about my personal life?"

He jumped in surprise, turning quickly to face his friend. "H-How much of that did you hear?" he asked, knowing full well she'd heard it all.

"I heard every word, Steve. You know I did."

"When you told me about the man you left but compared everyone else to…"

"Tony."

"Why did you lie to me?"

Holly shook her head as she pulled her hair free from the up-do. "Admittedly, part of the reason was that no girl likes to admit she's been cheated on. There were things going on in my head at the time, Steve. You have to understand that. Tony went missing, my grandfather slipped into a coma and died, and I was hospitalized. Maybe I would have forgiven him if my head didn't feel like someone put my brain in a blender."

He ducked his head to look up into her dark eyes that told him there was much more to this story. "There's something you're not telling me."

"Maybe, but the real reason I lied was what just happened. Fuck, I never even wanted you to know that we were ever together in the first place." She sighed heavily. "The 'Avengers Initiative' was one of the worst kept secrets ever if you had the right security clearance. As soon as you woke up from the ice and your name was put on that list with Tony's… I didn't want knowing what happened to change the way you and Tony worked on a team together."

"I swear, I wouldn't have said anything had that…"

"And I don't blame you or Peggy for telling you," she continued, ignoring completely his attempt at an explanation. "She didn't know the whole story either. It probably came up in conversation while you were with her. But anyways, now you know. I'm sorry I kept it from you, but hopefully you understand why." At his nod, she let out a slow yawn. "I've got to get out of this dress."

* * *

_September 29, 2008_

_Malibu, California_

Holly slowly descended the familiar steps down to Tony's basement garage with a head full of questions. She gripped the handrail tightly in the vain hope that her anger would dissipate. When she reached the glass door, she punched in her personal code that he gave her before she left his house after her first time there two years earlier.

"Good afternoon, Miss Morgan. Mister Stark is about five minutes out. Is there anything you need?" the AI asked softly as if he could sense something was amiss.

"No thanks, Jarvis. I just need to think, to try to process this," she responded, plopping herself down on the leather sofa in front of the flat screen television just inside the room and dropped her head into her hands. So the secret project he'd been working on in his basement was…some kind of space suit or something. What about that could be so bad that he couldn't tell her? She lifted her head a few minutes later when she heard the beeping of a code being entered into the door. Quickly smoothing her skirt, she stood up. "Hi," she said softly.

"Hey you," he replied, trying to hide the guilty look on his face. "So I assume you saw all of that."

Holly nodded, pointing at the gold and "hot rod red" suit hanging by one of the work benches finally uncovered. She couldn't help but smirk slightly at the realization that it matched the old Deuce Coupe hot rod. "And I assume that suit is what you've been down here working on." She folded her arms across her waist protectively, rubbing at an imaginary scuff on the concrete floor with her shoe.

He shoved his hands into his pants pockets. "Something like that. I-I'm sorry, Hol."

She began chewing on her right index fingernail as she stared at the metal suit. "And here I thought you were just ignoring me." She pressed a gentle touch to the glass circle in the middle of the chest piece of the suit. "I'm guessing your new hardware powers the suit."

Tony nodded, coming up behind her and circling his arms around her waist. He sighed in relief when she relaxed against him as he finally told her all about the original suit made out of weapon parts, Yinsen saving his life, Gulmira, and Stane.

Holly turned in his arms to face him. "You've been busy," she whispered, straightening a wrinkle in his gold patterned tie that only she could see. "I'm a little hurt that I wasn't in on the fun."

"I-I wanted to keep you safe. The less you knew, the better, remember? Obie could have come after you, too." He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her forehead. "I told you that I couldn't forgive myself if something happened to you because of me."

"I appreciate it, Tony, but you know that I can take care of myself. I'd much rather be informed and prepared than kept in the dark."

"I know you can. That's part of the reason I love you so much. You're not a damsel in distress."

She'd never get to say what she came to say at this rate. When he quickly broke away and half jogged over to his desk, she knew it would at least be a long conversation. "Tony, I… I need to talk to you."

"What a coincidence, I need to talk to you too." Opening the desk drawer, he produced the small black velvet box. "I should have given this to you a long time ago," he admitted, completely ignoring her desire for an audience.

Holly began to take long, deep breaths in an attempt to slow her heart rate. There was no mistaking what the small box was. "W-What are you doing?"

"Remember when I said that I had a surprise for you?" At her cautious nod, he motioned toward the suit. "I'd just gotten back from flying that thing for the first time. I almost called you so many times, but I couldn't just say that I was flying around Malibu without explaining everything else. I was so excited." He smiled. "You've always been my first call." Placing the box in her hands, he pulled her against him and rested his forehead against hers. "I actually talked with Michael a couple of weeks before the demonstration. He said he'd be honored if I asked."

Her breathing quickened into little more than a series of gasps as it felt like her ribs were squeezing her lungs in a vice grip.

"Open it, please," he whispered, waiting with baited breath to gauge her reaction.

She slowly opened the box, revealing a rather impressive engagement ring. The large center diamond was circled by bead-set diamonds as well as a diamond band. She was no expert, but the ring had to be almost three carats and possibly set in platinum.

"I've made everything else right, now I want to make it right with you," he sighed. "Marry me, Holly."

She felt her hands shaking as she looked down at the small box she held. Holly closed her eyes tightly as a thousand thoughts came swirling to mind. She opened her mouth to answer before closing it quickly. The last thing she thought would come to mind at this juncture did.

She had been planning to leave him the moment he got back before she knew he was missing.

She had been planning to leave him because of one simple reason.

Tony shut his eyes tightly as his hands held her waist even tighter. "Please say something."

_Do you have any comment on the rumor that out of the thirteen Maxim cover models for 2007, Tony Stark slept with twelve of them? …I will tell you that the source is impeachable._

That reporter's annoying voice kept echoing in her mind. The more that little sound bite repeated on loop, the more infuriated she became. She snapped the box shut. "I can't."

"Wha—Why? I… What's going on?" he stammered, taking a step back from his girlfriend. "I don't understand."

Tossing the most expensive piece of jewelry she'd ever held haphazardly onto the work bench, she shook her head at his flabbergasted expression. "I'll tell you what I don't understand. I've been trying to wrap my mind around it for four months now. I don't understand how the _fuck_ you thought you'd do it and I'd never find out."

Tony grabbed her arm to plead with her. "Baby, you found out about the suit the same time everyone else did. Well, except for Pepper. And Obie. Pepper caught me in the act, so it was a little different…" Realizing he was drifting, he shook his head. "And I already told you why I couldn't tell you of all people until now."

"Tony, it's not about the suit. It never has been. Let's pretend for a moment that I said yes to your proposal and we made it to the altar. Were you just going to cross your fingers when they made you promise to 'forsake all others'?"

He released her arm, dumbfounded. "What are you getting at?"

"Didn't you wonder why all of the stuff I was keeping here was gone when you got back?" Holly looked up at the ceiling, realizing quickly that she had lost the battle against her tears.

"I… I don't think I paid that much attention…"

"The _minute_ I knew you were airborne, I came and cleaned all my stuff out of here. Jarvis transferred my files and scrubbed your server to make sure you couldn't get back at them. I was going to tell you to go to hell and take whoever was wearing your dress shirt that was soaked in someone else's trashy Ed Hardy perfume with you the moment you landed." Wiping tears off her cheeks with the palms of her hands, she reached for the nearest heavy object – a socket wrench.

Tony ducked instinctively when she hurled the wrench at his head in frustration. He couldn't stop the sigh of relief that slipped out when the flying object sailed right over the Saleen S7 behind him and came into contact with the concrete wall with a crack. Shutting his eyes tightly, Tony clapped a hand over his mouth and stared up at the cold concrete ceiling. "Baby… Oh god, I… I'm sorry. Y-You were… Something was wrong I think, and you kept blowing me off."

"And instead of asking me what was wrong, you… You just fucked someone else? Tony even for you that doesn't make a damn bit of sense. And not just one other person, thirteen. How the fuck did you have _time_ to do that?"

At that instant, the conversation began to run together. The couple began talking at the same time on completely different topics.

"I mean, for god's sake, twelve _Maxim_ cover models. That's not even subtle. Like it's not even a secret anymore. A reporter approached me about it before you left. She said she was from…"

"She approached me about a piece for…"

"…_Vanity Fair_," they said in unison. Both parties froze, looking at each other with equal parts disbelief and disgust.

"What was her name?" Holly asked, finally breaking the silence.

"I-I don't remember. Wait, what is this about _Maxim _models?" As soon as the words left his lips, he cringed. He'd heard the rumor floating around before he left for Afghanistan, but had brushed it off. He still had his subscription to the famous magazine, his relationship with Holly notwithstanding. They had interesting articles from time to time. But the only time he didn't deny the rumor was… Not that the three soldiers in the "fun-vee" lived long enough to tell anyone else.

"She caught me when I was on my way to watch them pack up the Jericho. She asked me to comment on the rumor. Her name was Christine Everheart, not that _I'll_ ever forget. She said her source was sound. I told her to go fuck herself." Holly paused, letting out a sad laugh. "But clearly she fucked you."

"I know you don't believe me, but I swear, the _Maxim_ girls? That whole thing was a rumor."

"She said her source was solid."

"I… I don't know what to tell you. I heard it the first time and laughed. I jokingly confirmed it once."

"So her source was you or whoever you told."

"It couldn't have been. She came to see you _before_ I left, right?" At her nod, he continued. "The only three people who heard me confirm it were the three soldiers in the humvee with me…and they're all dead. So I don't know who this 'source' is or was, but I swear it's not true."

Holly took two steps back, resting her chin on her folded hands in thought. "Let's say I believe you, Tony. Let's just say that I for _one second_ believe that this is some kind of cosmic set up and you're innocent."

"It is."

"I don't believe you for a second, but let's pretend that I do. That shirt on the floor covered in eau de slut is pretty damning evidence of something. And I'm guessing it's that reporter. Am I right?" When his only response was a faint "yeah", she crossed her arms over her chest and turned away from him.

"Why didn't you stick to your plan? Why haven't you said anything before now?"

She looked back over her shoulder at Tony. He'd just handed her an opening to say what she'd come to say on a silver platter. She could say her piece and be done. Sucking the inside corner of her lip between her teeth, she began to gnaw on the inside of her cheek. She _could_ tell him. It would be the right thing to do. It's what Vickie wanted her to do. But she was hurt. Deep down, she was almost certain he wasn't lying about the rumor being true. After a moment, the rest of her brain, the part that wouldn't let her believe he was telling the truth, decided that since he'd hurt her, he didn't deserve to know. "I was naïve," she half-lied. "I was in love. I foolishly thought that…I don't know what I expected. Then you were in a cave somewhere. I had other things to worry about at that point."

"You could have left when I got back…"

"Because _that_ would have gone over well. I can see the headlines now, 'Back-from-the-dead Tony Stark dumped on recovery bed'. People would have been lining up around the block to give me defense contracts," she said with a sarcastic laugh. Once she'd started the lie, she had to keep going.

Tony nodded slowly, looking down at the floor and then back up at her. He didn't often get angry, but he began to quickly feel the emotion bubbling to the surface. "So you stayed just long enough so that it wouldn't look bad when you left? That's low, Holly."

She rolled her eyes. "This coming from the man-whore who took me for a fool."

The emotional bubble burst. "Hey, I fucked up. I admitted it and tried to apologize, but at least I'm not a paid whore like you." When she opened her mouth to protest, he held up his hand. "No, you don't get to speak. You played the part of loving girlfriend and diligent business partner long enough to profit from all of this. Let's do a little math, shall we? That first check was for three hundred grand. I happen to know that in my absence Obie manufactured three hundred more Jericho systems. That's four and a half million for you, which brings your grand total to $4.8 million. Heidi Fleiss ain't got nothing on you, sweetheart."

Before she could quite process exactly what was happening, Holly felt her right hand ball up into a fist as she quickly brought her knuckles into contact with Tony's left cheek bone. She was pleasantly surprised when he stumbled backward a half step, clapping his hand over the spot where a bruise would quickly begin to form. "So what was I supposed to do? Tell me! What would you have had me do? Everyone around me was telling me that you were dead. They told me to honor your memory and keep buggering on, so I did," she screamed, this time telling the truth.

"All the while pocketing money from Obie's under the table deals."

"Pot, meet kettle," she spat. "I'm not giving the money back. I earned it. Face it, if you had come back on time, no muss no fuss, you would never have questioned anything. I'd be finishing up the other _seven hundred_ Jericho systems you promised me. I'd be getting rich, and you'd be getting richer."

"Don't make me into the bad guy here," Tony warned.

"Up until you told me that you loved me, I didn't expect a damn thing from you. I was just another booty call, and I was fine with that. The moment you said 'I love you too'… I foolishly thought that it meant something."

Tony gazed down at his Bvlgari watch, idly picking at the metal band. "It does. It did," he whispered, slowing his breathing in the hopes of quieting his pounding heart. Her reason for staying stung, but not near as badly as his mistakes making her think any time he told her that he loved her didn't mean anything. He dropped himself dejectedly into one of the leather rolling chairs, almost certain that the sound of air rushing out of the bottom cushion was the sound of everything they'd built coming crashing down around him. He'd hurt her so badly. He couldn't blame her if she couldn't forgive him. "I don't know what to say."

"I do. Have a nice fucking life without me, Tony." Holly turned sharply on her stiletto and marched back up the stairs, managing to contain herself until she found herself safely ensconced in her black convertible. When she tossed her purse onto the passenger seat, that damned little white envelope fell onto the floorboard. She wasn't able to make it out of Tony's driveway before the sobs started.

The moment she was out of earshot, Tony whipped his cell phone out of his suit jacket pocket and quickly dialed a number with one hand while unscrewing the lid to a full bottle of scotch with the other. "Hal?"

"_Just saw the press conference, Tony…_"

"I'm sure you did. Deal's off."

"_W-What? I don't understand. Why?"_

"I-I… Stark Industries can't go through with it." He quickly ended the call and tossed the phone down on the leather sofa before taking a healthy swig of the amber liquid straight from the bottle. The old man went to his grave thinking that his granddaughter was going to live happily ever after as Holiday Morgan Stark. That was the only reason Michael Morgan consented to the deal – Tony would have been family. Now that he was never going to happen, he…He may have a certain reputation, but he was certainly not a con artist. A con artist would be all he'd ever be if he let this deal go through. The old man was friends with _his_ old man. Not that he was his father's biggest fan, but he had far too much respect for Michael Morgan to betray his trust the moment he was in the ground.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

After returning to her apartment, Holly immediately ran to the bathroom. Through her sobs, she managed to squeeze enough eye makeup remover onto a cotton ball, remove the makeup, and wash her face before stumbling into her bedroom and pulling on an old pair of pajamas. She needed to talk to some booze about this.

It was normal to feel this way, right? She made her way into the kitchen and poured herself a healthy glass of red wine. It was over. But she knew deep down that it would never truly be over. Every time she pulled back her bedspread to reveal the blue and white striped sheets that had been on the bed on her birthday, she'd think of him. Every time she went into her lab at Morgan Defense and Armor, she'd think of him saying that he thought it was sexy the way she "talked science" or held a gun. Every time she turned on the television and saw him, she'd only be reminded of how much she still loved him despite everything.

Taking a large gulp of wine, she felt tears stinging her eyes again at the realization that she'd let herself get so close to him that she barely knew how to be on her own again. Walking into the living room, she flopped down on her white futon. The phone hadn't started ringing yet, but she was preparing herself with some liquid courage. She would need all she could get when she would inevitably have to start explaining things. Her heart sank when she heard a knock on the door. "Go away!" she called after taking another healthy swig.

"Ma'am, I only need a few minutes of your time. My name is…"

She rolled her eyes. News sure traveled fast… "I don't really care who you are. I don't have anything to say to the press at this time!"

"I'm not with the press, Miss Morgan. My name is Phil Coulson. I'm an agent with the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division. I just need to talk with you for a moment about any knowledge you may have of the Iron Man suit and the events on the rooftop."

"What branch of the government does that fall under? I've never heard of you."

"We've already debriefed Mister Stark."

With a groan, she pushed herself into a standing position and opened the door, well aware of the fact that she looked like absolute shit. She tilted her head at the middle-aged man standing before her with a kind look in his eye. "Come in, please. I'm sorry that I'm in my pajamas…"

"You'd be surprised what some people are wearing when we debrief them."

"D-Debrief?" Holly asked, suddenly scared that she knew far too much. "I only know what Tony told me."

Coulson lowered himself into her old tan rocking chair. "And we just want to make sure he's told us everything. So please, just tell me what you know so we can close the books, so to speak, on this one. Then I'll vanish and you can go back to your wine."

She nodded. Government regulation was a part of her job life she learned long ago to just smile and nod when they started asking questions. She picked up her wine glass and took a sip. "I never saw the suit until earlier today," she began. As she continued her tale, she found herself pleasantly surprised that a government agent was that good of a listener.

"Well, Miss Morgan, on behalf of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division, I thank you for your time. I think we have everything we need," he concluded, using the arms of the chair to brace himself as he stood up. As he turned to go, he stopped suddenly. Looking back over his shoulder at the petite brunette, he pulled a business card out of his pocket and stepped over to hand it to her. "I hear you do magnificent work. Give me a call in a couple of days. We may want to steal you away from the family business."

* * *

**Author'****s**** Note**: Alright, here's the chapter I've been promising for a while now. Now that I've posted this, I can say that I've laid all the easter eggs for the rest of this story. I'm rather excited.

Song for this chapter is Florence + the Machine's "Lover to Lover". I've updated the playlist, too. ( www dot youtube dot com / playlist?list=PLjgjKHy4ofeD7d1-R6eJ_GWIiGkQz56sn&feature=mh_lolz )

I don't own anything except for Holly. Many thanks to **Trick-Photography** for looking this over for me.

Enjoy!


	13. Chapter Twelve

Chapter Twelve

_Howling ghosts they reappear  
In mountains that are stacked with fear  
But you're a king and I'm a lionheart…  
His crown lit up the way as we moved slowly  
Pass the wondering eyes of the ones that were left behind.  
Though far away…  
We're still the same…_

The next evening at 7:45 pm found Holly being buzzed through to the penthouse elevator in Stark Tower, limping through the lobby with her messenger bag slung across her body and her purse awkwardly trapped in her hand with one of the crutch hand grips. She sighed heavily as she watched the numbers on the digital display in the glass elevator continue to get higher as it whizzed toward its destination. If that…woman hadn't shown up at the benefit the night before, she might have been able to negotiate a better, less awkward meeting place.

She'd left the party, changed, and plopped herself down in front of her computer. She spent a couple hours translating the crudely drawn picture of Tony's vision into a manipulable image onto her computer. Once the image had been rendered, she set the computer to making an actual suit and headed to bed. Hopefully, he hadn't gained too much weight in four years. She'd used the dimensions that she remembered from his old tux measurements. This separate shirt and pants combination was just a first draft. If they didn't fit, she could retool the design with the proper measurements.

The ever-curious scientist in her couldn't help but be mildly curious at the fact that Tony had managed to power an entire building with a large-scale arc reactor. He'd told her they were trying to make one work at Stark Industries long before his detour into a cave. Obadiah Stane said it was just to make the hippies shut up, but Holly never really liked that man, a fact confirmed by the fact that he'd tried to kill Tony. Maybe Tony "privatizing world peace" had made him a better person. Maybe living through an alien attack had changed her, too. Who knew?

The one thing she did know was that the elevator was climbing faster and faster toward her destination. She slowly ran her hands down her face, elongating her cheeks and making her come to resemble Wes Craven's Ghostface. Maybe one day she'd be able to sleep in her own bed in her own apartment again. Maybe one day she wouldn't have to have awkward encounters with Tony…

The elevator bell dinged and the doors began to open, revealing Tony's expansive living room. The view out of the floor-to-ceiling windows across the room was breathtaking. The loud clang of a bottle landing on the stone bar top in the distance brought her back into focus.

"You made it," Tony observed with a tired smile, pouring two glasses of bourbon. He remembered earlier in the day that she always preferred Makers Mark to his preferred brand of scotch. He didn't have any wine on hand, but he did have the bourbon. "How's the leg?"

"Same as yesterday, Tony." Leaning over the bench, she opened her bag and extricated her laptop and the two pieces of underlayment she'd fabricated in the wee hours of the morning.

"I'm sorry, was it something I said? Should I have started off with an insult? 'You made it. God you look like hell.' Better?"

Holly made a face and adjusted the sport headband holding back her dark curls. "Of course not. I'm sorry. Honestly it's a little sore. The physical therapist is out to kill me, I swear."

He stepped out from behind the bar with two glasses in hand. "Well the sooner you're out of that brace, the sooner you can walk on those stilts you call shoes again. It's so weird having to look down at you."

Unable to stifle a chuckle, she tossed her long hair back over her pink tank-top covered shoulders and looked up at him for the first time. The bags under his eyes meant that he'd probably slept even less than she had recently. "Trouble sleeping? T-The bags under your eyes…"

"Construction dust getting to me," he lied, brushing off her observation. "They've been doing their thing up here. Tried to keep out of the way, but the stuff gets into the air ducts…"

Biting the inside of her lip with a nod, she hobbled around to the front of the bench and lowered herself down. Tony Stark having a dust allergy? Yeah, and there were little green men on Mars. Besides, while he'd said "construction dust", the corner of his mouth turned up and he sniffed…and he was talking fast. His tell, the chink in his poker face. He was lying about something. Question was what was he lying about? He seemed jittery. Surely that wasn't because of her... "At least someone's come to fix your damage. We can't all call someone and say 'Tony Stark' and have someone out within the hour," she muttered.

"Do you want me to make a call?" he offered quickly, sitting down beside her. "I-I'll make a call in the morning. You're making a house call. Least I can do is get someone to make a call…on your house."

"Breathe. You're practically going a mile a minute." Holly handed him the black and grey shirt and pants set of the underlayment. "Go make sure these fit."

"You just want to see me naked," he ribbed. She'd walked right into that one. "It's been too long. You're jonesing for a look."

Holly knocked back the contents of the glass in one go. "I can say unequivocally that I have absolutely no interest in seeing you naked. That's Pepper's area now, anyway." She raised an eyebrow. "Wait, where is Pepper?"

Tony clutched the garments to his chest and strode with mock offense across the living room and into the bathroom. "In Malibu. I'm going to join her tomorrow." Shutting the door behind him, he began to quickly change into his new underlayment. He couldn't help but notice just how well the pieces fit. "Damn woman, do you have a measuring tape imprinted in your head?"

Noticing that he'd left his glass untouched, she discreetly grabbed it up off the glass-topped table and took a long whiff of the desirable brown liquid inside. He had more, she reasoned as she sipped slowly. "I was just working off of four year old tux measurements in my head. Is it too tight?" When he stepped back into the living room, she unexpectedly began to choke on the bourbon.

"That's what you get for drinking someone else's beverage," Tony observed dryly. "But no, it's not too tight. It's just what one would want for…whatever you call this."

Holly wiped away a small drop of the drink that had escaped onto the outside corner of her mouth before grabbing her computer and booting it up. "I'm a cripple. I can't carry my own drink. Besides, you abandoned yours. Isn't that alcohol abuse or something?" she questioned jokingly in an effort to disguise the real reason she inadvertently inhaled that last sip. Not that he was ever out of shape per se, but could it be that Tony Stark had been putting some work into his physique? That last sip went down her windpipe because she wasn't expecting to see the fabric of the cuff of the grey three-quarter length sleeves strain against his flexed biceps when he folded his arms across his chest. Why, _why_ did her ex have to be a man who only seemed to get better with age? The man may be a bastard, but damn it if he wasn't a sexy little bastard. Once the computer was ready to use, she looked back up at him.

He tugged his jeans back on to cover up the form-fitting pants to the underlayment. Not that he had any problems with showing off any reason to hide, but the situation was already awkward enough without him parading around the apartment in pants that left very little to the imagination (not that she would need to imagine). "I've been thinking about what you said about it being better to have this all one piece." Grabbing the two now empty glasses, he made his way back to the bar for refills.

"I minimized the cuts in what you're wearing. The differences between that and a full body…"

"Are that a full body suit can come in gold?" he interrupted before handing her another glass of bourbon.

"It can come in whatever color you want, Tony." Plucking the glass from his hand, she took note of his expectant expression. "While it would be nice to get out of New York and have a couple days off, I don't have time to hand deliver to California."

"This is why FedEx exists," Tony quipped sarcastically.

Holly backed away slightly and put a hand over her heart to feign offense. "Surely you jest," she retorted with a laugh. "I'll have a junior agent that I can intimidate easily hand deliver it when it's done. Besides, nothing kills the 'I just saved the world and I'm taking some vacation time with my girl' mood like an ex showing up at the door."

Nodding in agreement, he watched her quickly key in the changes he'd requested before shutting the laptop. That had taken much less time than he anticipated. He'd realized the night before at the party just how much he'd missed talking shop with her. He knew the moment Pepper left earlier in the day that he wasn't going to get any sleep, but then again when did he anymore? And she was leaving.

She closed the bag around her laptop and slung the strap over her shoulder before attempting to push herself up into a standing position with a crutch. She inhaled sharply at the small jolt of electricity that coursed through her when Tony brought a steadying hand to her arm. "Thanks," she said warmly, grabbing her purse off the couch. "Soak up some sun for me, huh?"

He eyed her exposed arms that bore little resemblance to the sun-kissed limbs that he used to spend countless hours touching and being touched by with a wry smile. "That's more Pepper's thing than mine, but I'll make sure someone gets some sun for you. I don't think I've ever seen you…what's this color, translucent?"

"S.H.I.E.L.D.'s kept me busy. Staying brown kind of falls down on the priority list." Holly let go of the crutch hand hold and pushed the down button for the elevator. Just as she began to step back into the elevator, she heard Tony calling her name. She blocked the elevator doors with her body and turned back around.

"Stay safe, okay?" he asked as his face gave away the gravity of his concern.

"Between living in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s basement and the Captain checking in with me in one form or another about twice a day, I think I'll be okay," she reassured with a small grin before the doors closed in front of her. Just as she began to wonder what would prompt Tony to suddenly be concerned for her, the elevator car suddenly filled with the distinct sounds of Electric Six and the screen of her phone indicated an unfamiliar phone number. "This is Holiday Morgan."

"_Miss Morgan, my name is Peter Rosen with the Diamond River Group. How are you this evening?_"

"I-I'm fine and yourself?"

"_I am well, but my group is not. We are a private security firm that finds itself in need of your help solving a problem…"_

* * *

For the most part, Steve's ninety-fourth birthday (or twenty-ninth if his slightly altered motorcycle license was used) passed with relative quietness two days earlier, he mused as he rode his motorcycle home from another session at his gym of choice.

The Director had given him a succinct message of congratulations when passing him in the halls at S.H.I.E.L.D. when he'd stopped by Holly's office to ask if she could be his plus one to Stark's party the next day. A couple of agents he couldn't name wished him a happy birthday as he exited the building. He'd called Peggy when he received the thoughtful card she'd sent. They talked for an hour and a half, only stopping when her youngest grandchild finally arrived with her newest great-grandchild.

No sooner had that conversation ended than Holly called him apologizing profusely that she'd forgotten his birthday until just then. _That_ phone call ended with in her arriving at his building an hour later in a taxi. Due to her still being on crutches, Steve was forced to carry the three boxes she'd brought with her up the stairs (not that he really minded).

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

_"I didn't forget at all, Steve. I just wanted to surprise you," Holly explained with a smile as she served him the cottage pie she'd brought for him before taking a bite of her own. _

_"Well you certainly succeeded." He hummed in appreciation as the flavor combination of mashed potatoes, cheese, ground beef and vegetables met his taste buds. "You really didn't have to do this."_

_"Say that all you want, but I'm going to maintain the opposite position. Did you really think that I'd let you celebrate alone?" _

_Steve set his fork down on the edge of his plate before meeting his friend's line of sight again. "I hadn't really planned on celebrating, truth be told. There's not much reason to…" he admitted, cutting himself off when Holly rolled her eyes. "What?"_

_"My twenty-third birthday was the best birthday I've ever had." She paused as a small chuckle escaped through her smile. "My eighty-eight year old grandfather drove to my apartment at five am and made the same birthday breakfast he'd made for me every birthday since even before my parents died: blueberry pancakes with the syrup arranged into a smiley face, scrambled eggs, and bacon. He cooked while I got ready for work, and we ate together. After work, Tony took me out to dinner and…" Holly stopped her story and bit the corner of her lip awkwardly. _

_Steve nodded. He could guess exactly what came after that, and he most certainly did not want to know._

_"Then the next year, I turned twenty-four here in New York alone. I woke up from a dream where I was eating my birthday breakfast with my grandfather. The day started off in tears because he'd been dead for almost six months, and I hadn't said a single word to Tony in almost five at that point. People remembered my birthday, sure. I had messages from old sorority sisters and college friends throughout the day. Some aunts, uncles, and cousins called, but there was no one to celebrate with. I was about to leave S.H.I.E.L.D. to go drink myself to sleep when Coulson ran into my office and announced that he was going to take me out to dinner to celebrate. And I burst into tears for the second time in one birthday. The last time that happened, I was eight." Holly reached across the table and took his hand into hers. "So the reason I'm here and making you celebrate is that I know what it means when someone, even one person, remembers your birthday when you feel so alone."_

_Steve smiled as he squeezed her hand in return. "You still didn't have to do all this," he whispered, smiling again despite the tears now spilling onto both of their faces. "You certainly didn't have to get me anything."_

_ "Just open it, you goober." She shook her head as she watched him peel back the paper skeptically. When he shifted his gaze back and forth between her face and the two part collage frame in front of him slack-jawed, she knew she'd hit a home run. _

_"I-Is that…" he stammered, pointing to the left hand side of the frame that contained a sketch of his old uniform complete with small material swatches taped in various places and hand-written notes. He confirmed his own suspicions when he saw "A. Morgan" in the bottom right corner._

_"The original design for your uniform, yes it is. My grandfather kept it in his office, and I took it to mine when I moved here." Holly watched delighted as his eyes moved to the computer rendering in the other side of the frame. _

_"And this is your design," Steve observed before squinting at the thin, spiky handwriting in the margins under the color swatches. "These notes aren't yours."_

_"They're Coulson's. He was practically giddy when I handed him that. Technically, my rendering with his notes wasn't supposed to leave S.H.I.E.L.D., so if anyone asks…"_

_ "I have no idea where I got it." He winked. "Thank you."_

_"While I'm thinking about it, I brought both sets of candles. Do you want to be ninety-four or twenty-nine when you blow out the candles?"_

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Still astride his motorcycle after killing the engine in front of his apartment building, Steve pulled off his helmet and rolled his neck until it popped. He made his way up the handful of steps and into the building, stopping just inside to check his mail.

Netflix DVD.

Netflix DVD.

Grocery store coupons.

Utility bill.

…Something from a "D. Lewis" with a New Mexico postmark? He shoved the other items between his left arm and torso before taking the stairs two at a time and attempting to open the flat rate box simultaneously. Realizing the contents were wrapped tightly in several layers of newspaper, he decided to wait until he was inside to completely unwrap them.

Once he'd unlocked his door, he dropped the keys on the table just inside before locking the door back behind him. The two DVDs, coupons, and the bill were dropped unceremoniously onto the sofa in favor of the mystery package. He grinned at the realization that whatever the contents were, Darcy had wrapped them in a couple pages from the funnies. He began to gently undo the tape to save the comics for later before a smaller envelope marked with "READ ME FIRST" in red marker caught his eye. Opening it, he pulled out a piece of sky blue construction paper and began to read.

"_Steve,_

_You never told me when your birthday was, but I happened to remember from a lecture once upon a time that "Captain America" had his birthday on July 4__th__. (If that's really your birthday, it'll be super easy to remember.) I didn't want to chance forgetting and being awarded the Worst Friend Ever trophy, so… Happy birthday (?) !_

_Sorry this is late, by the way. I've been working non-stop to get everything set up and settled before my big move. The July 4__th__ birthday thing didn't hit me until I was in the middle of the local fireworks show. Oops._

_I was going to go ahead and snag us some baseball tickets, but then I realized that I don't know your super schedule… It would definitely blow to have you jet mid-game because someone lit whatever the Cap version of the Bat Signal is. I move in August 10__th__, so we can plan then. _

_You'll have to get online and tell me how it feels to be ninety-four. : - )_

_Darcy_

_PS: You can open your present now._"

Steve leaned over and pushed the power button to boot up his laptop before heading into the kitchen for a glass of water. As he poured himself a healthy glass, he eyed the last of the cupcakes Holly had baked and brought along with her for his birthday sitting on a plate inside the refrigerator. He grabbed it up. It was tempting. Holly swore she wasn't much of a baker, but she was better at it than he was.

Taking the cupcake and water back out to the computer and his waiting present on the dining room table, he found himself thankful for his increased metabolism. Sure, he couldn't drink his sorrows away or drink to celebrate and have it count, but he could pack away things like cupcakes that he could actually afford now. He clicked the icon to open Skype before turning his attention back to his present. Peeling back the carefully taped newsprint, he found himself holding a copy of Frank Sinatra: The Columbia Years (1943-1952) on CD.

He was almost too busy eyeing the partially familiar track listing to notice that a text bubble popped up on the computer screen indicating that Darcy was Skype calling him. He shook his head, clearing his thoughts before indicating that he was going to accept the call. "Hey!" he greeted warmly once Darcy's face and partially packed up room appeared on his computer screen.

"Hey yourself! Did you get the box I sent you?" she asked expectantly before taking a drink from her beer.

"I did, yes. I just now opened it. This is fantastic! I can't wait to play it."

"Glad you like it. My parents have a copy of it, and I ripped a copy of theirs. I was listening to it when I was trying to think of what to get you… And is that a cupcake?"

Steve laughed before picking it up. "Holly brought a couple over on my birthday along with dinner. She wanted to make sure I didn't spend my birthday alone. And yes, my birthday _is_ July 4th." When his new friend smiled, he removed the confection from the paper around the cake.

"Did she get you an awesome present, Mister 'I'm Ninety-Four But Don't Look It'?"

He dropped the cupcake back down onto the plate, holding up a finger to tell her to hang on before jogging out of the camera sight and bringing back the two part collage frame. He held it up to the computer.

* * *

_July 10, 2009_

_S.H.I.E.L.D. Headquarters_

_Manhattan_

Whipping his cell phone out of his pants pocket, Tony Stark dialed a number he knew by heart. The call rang twice before being transferred to voicemail. "She's ignoring me," he scoffed, before realizing that she'd changed her outgoing message. "If she lets it ring twice, she's ignoring me."

"_You have reached the voicemail of Holiday Morgan, defense consultant. I'm very sorry to have missed your call. If you leave me a detailed message, I will return your call within twenty-four hours. If you need to fax me documents, please send those to (212) 847-0978. If this is an emergency, please call (212) 546-3245 and ask for Phil Coulson. Thank you._"

"Who the hell still has a fax machine?" Ending the call without leaving a message, he brought up his contact list and selected a second number. There was something he needed to do. "Agent Coulson, mind telling me where Holly Morgan's office is?"

"_She doesn't want to see you, Stark_."

"Tell me, or I'll break down your firewall, leave some interesting stuff on your search history, and take a look around what you've got. Who knows what goodies I'll find along the way to her office," he countered in a sing-song voice.

"_Tenth floor, first door on the left._"

"That wasn't so hard, now was it?" Tony punched the up arrow to call the elevator before hanging up. The palladium building up in his system was going to kill him. The thing keeping him alive was now swiftly bringing him to his end. Was it too much to hope for that her anger had softened in the almost ten months since their separation? It probably was, but he still held out hope that he could see her smile one last time. He straightened his tie unconsciously as the elevator doors shut behind him. Coulson said she didn't want to see him. Exactly what had the little minx told him? Had she left a blanket order for the middle-aged agent to keep him away from her office?

Stepping out of the car onto the tenth floor, he immediately noticed that the aforementioned first door on the left was open. He peered around the white metal door frame and couldn't help but smile. Holly sat behind her expansive glass-topped desk, pen clenched between her teeth, sifting through a mound of papers. Some things just never changed, like her inability to find anything in her work space. Tony's eyes, out of habit, began following the soft lines of her neck, down the straight edges of the lapel on her black tailored blazer to the scoop neck of the white blouse beneath it. If she leaned forward any further, his trip to New York to open the Expo in a couple hours would have an unintended bonus. "You know, I seem to remember that you were supposed to call me after you made that new suit prototype. Don't tell me that you're still working on it," he called into the room, chuckling softly when she jumped in surprise.

Holly rolled her eyes and dropped the papers back onto the desk before shoving the pen into her black metal desk caddy. "What do you want, Tony?" She stood up and smoothed out her jacket and matching black pleated pants, intentionally avoiding his gaze.

"I liked it much better when you were sifting through papers wearing one of my shirts," he quipped, eyeing the tailored business clothing.

"I really don't have time for a stroll down memory lane right now. I've got a meeting in five minutes." She put her hands on her hips, showing off her blue fingernails.

Tony's brown eyes met hers, searching for any sign that beneath this icy exterior she'd accumulated, she was still the Holly that he used to know and love. The Holly he used to know _hated_ meetings, especially those between R&D and the suits. She certainly would never have blown him off to go to one. Hell, even if one stipulated to the fact that she might not be his biggest fan since they split up, the old Holly probably would have still found some way to use him as an excuse to get out of her meeting. His eyes searched hers, but came up empty. Gone was "his Holly" and the sparkle in her eyes that she always had when working on something new.

"I should probably ask _you_ if you've lost something the way you're staring," she growled, eyeing his grey pinstripe suit. "By the way, I caught your 'the suit and I are one' bullshit."

"Keeping tabs on me still? How sweet."

Holly jerked her head toward the open door at the sound of a soft knock on the metal. "Well, it's been a nice chat Stark, but my meeting is here."

"Am I interrupting anything?" the man at the door with sandy hair asked, eyes narrowing as he began to evaluate the potential threat level.

"No, Mister Stark was just about to get the hell out of my office," Holly assured him, looking at her ex as a menacing smile crossed her face.

"I don't believe we've had the pleasure," Tony stated, holding out his hand.

"Barton," the man replied curtly, staring blankly at Tony's extended hand.

Returning his hand to his pants pocket, Tony nodded slowly. "Right, well as much fun as this little pow wow will undoubtedly be, I'm going to go."

Clint Barton remained in the doorway until the elevator doors closed behind Tony Stark. Stepping into the office, he couldn't help but notice Holly pinching the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Are you okay? Do we need to reschedule?"

Tony shook his head when he heard her coldly brush off the encounter, saying she was fine. He pushed the elevator call button. He was going to die and she would still hate him. Nonetheless, he still had an Expo to open.

* * *

**Author's Note:** As always, I'm only borrowing Disney / Marvel / Stan Lee's creations. The only thing that is mine is Holly. Oh, and "Diamond River Group"? I don't own that, either. Credit for that goes to Dick Wolf. I borrowed the name from the _Law & Order_ mothership show, so if you may recognize that name... It will come in later.

Many thanks to **TrickPhotography** for being a listening ear and for catching my mistakes.

Oh, the song for this chapter is Of Monsters and Men's "King and Lionheart". It has been added to the youtube playlist ( www dot youtube dot com / playlist?list=PLjgjKHy4ofeD7d1-R6eJ_GWIiGkQz56sn)

I would like to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of you for reading, favoriting, alerting, and reviewing. Each one of those alert notifications that pop up in my email make me smile. Special thanks to those of you who have been with me since the beginning. I know I'm slow to update a lot (thanks, life), but nonetheless, I'm so grateful that y'all are still with me.

Action is coming. Be prepared.

Can't wait to hear what you think!

Jen


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